My baby boy hits two digits tomorrow.

As I’ve told you before, he’s in his first year of baseball and two days ago I learned that his coaches were going to let him try and pitch.

This left me a nervous wreck. “What if he doesn’t do any good? What if he embarrasses himself? He’s not ready.”

His coaches were completely cool as a cucumber about the whole thing.

So many times, so many, I wanted to tell the coaches that he wasn’t ready. I even wanted to tell my husband to have a talk with them and tell them “now isn’t the time.” I knew he wouldn’t, though, so I held my tongue.

Last night, he stepped up to the mound and I could tell he was nervous. Every fiber in my mother’s heart wanted to go rescue him from this discomfort.

Would you believe he struck out his first two batters? Far from embarrassing himself, he did very well riding on the confidence his coaches had in him.

I was telling my husband yesterday that, for moms, it can be so hard to let go. As my son has gotten older, I can see that he needs what my husband can provide him and other men, too—the guidance on how to grow into a man. I simply can’t provide that.

See, the coaches were fine with testing my son by forcing him out of his comfort zone. Men do this very well with our kids and we need to let them do it. I need to trust their instinct and follow their lead.

My son was so happy last night after getting to pitch one inning. As I saw the smile and confidence on his face, I realized I could have kept him from this important moment which would have been a shame. I’m so glad my guardian angel held me back.

Just like we should trust God when He calls us out of our comfort zone, we should also trust men when they show our children that they can push a little bit further. Without these pushes, Catholic Pilgrims, we simply can’t grow and we forget that we were made for more.

Have a blessed Friday.