Mt. Hood third baseman Megan Moeller calls softball her medicine.

Diagnosed with epilepsy as a sixth grader in 1997, her doctors told her she would no longer be able to participate in sports. But since her diagnosis, she has defied the odds, playing both softball and soccer her entire high school career and also participating in basketball her freshman and sophomore years at Ontario (Ore.) High School.

“I was told that I couldn’t play anymore, but I was like, someone can’t tell me that. It crushed me because sports are my life,” she said. “Knowing that I’ve overcome this has really helped, though. Softball has helped me through my struggles when I’ve been really sick. It takes everything away that I have to deal with.”

In her spare time she enjoys drawing, mostly realistic sketches, and writing poetry. She had two poems published while she was still in high school and even drew the cover art to the book they were encased in. “When I don’t have a ball in my hand, I have a pencil there instead,” she said.

A large amount of her poetry is written about playing softball and her experiences with being sick. She also likes to spend her time writing articles about her disease and sending them to her doctors. “I actually just wrote a really long article about what it’s like to be sick and how I’ve worked to overcome it,” she said. “That’s really what I want to do – help people. I want to take what I’ve learned from my life and tell someone else so that it will help to change them.”

Coming from a family of competitive athletes, Moeller, 20, knew that she wanted to continue with sports after high school and decided to drop out of women’s basketball after her sophomore year so that she could devote the majority of her time toward softball. During the winters of her junior and senior years, she participated in indoor softball, relentlessly pursuing her dream of playing softball in college.

Moeller first heard about MHCC from her softball coach at Ontario, whose daughter had attended college here. When she visited MHCC for softball recruiting, she met head softball coach Meadow McWhorter, and said that she immediately felt comfortable with the coach and her future teammates. She also said she liked the campus and the small-town feel of the school.

After she completes her first two years at Mt. Hood, the sophomore will transfer to Montana State to play third base for the Bobcats. At MSU, she will major in psychology and criminal justice, hoping to become either a paramedic or a juvenile counselor.

She was originally supposed to get a full scholarship to Portland State University but the deal fell through when the money was designated for another player. Southern Oregon University also showed interest in Moeller recently, but she committed to Montana State when they told her they were taking the scholarship money for a pitcher and putting it toward recruiting her. She will attend MSU with more than half of her tuition paid through her junior year, and will have a full tuition waiver her senior year.

Moeller, who has been playing softball for 14 years, is excited to go to MSU but is sad to leave her coach and teammates and her roommate, Saints’ pitcher Alexis Hadenfeld. “My family may be far away from me right now, but my teammates are a great group of girls and they are like my family and second home,” she said. “I’m confident with my team this year because we are strong all the way through. I’m really going to miss them.”

Moeller, whose 15-year-old sister Ashley was recently told she would no longer be able to play as a utility player for her high school softball team due to mononucleosis and a liver infection, was given two game balls signed by the Saints players to give her for encouragement.

“Jill also gave me her home run ball to give to Ashley and I called her and told her that Jill hit a home run for her,” she said. “It’s amazing that the girls are all there for me, but they are also there for my family, and a lot of them don’t even know my sister.”

The third-baseman, fondly referred to as “Moe” by her teammates, was out for nearly the entire season last year with a torn LCL (a knee injury). She sustained the injury while picking up a bunt that rolled foul along the third baseline and pivoting to throw out the runner at first base. Moeller has battled back and resumed her spot in the starting line-up but she said that her knee still bothers her sometimes. She will have an MRI this summer and to find out if it is necessary to have surgery to repair the damage.

Moeller said she is really afraid of reinjuring herself. “It scares me. I think about it all the time. Watching Sunny get hurt (on Tuesday) was like watching a rerun. I know exactly what she’s going through.”

She said she learned a lot while she was injured last season. “After you’ve been playing for a long time, you think you know just about everything there is to know about softball, but when you are sitting and watching on the sidelines, you notice so much more about the game and how big communication actually is on the field,” she said.

Moeller has about 75 inspirational quotes hanging-up everywhere in her room and before every game she looks at them and tries to find new ones to inspire her. A couple of her favorites are “Dream what you want to dream, go where you want to go, for they are the guiding lights of your heart,” and “Life is full of obstacles but it’s up to you to overcome them,” a quote by Rose Kennedy. These quotes and the influence of softball on her life have taught her many life lessons.

“Softball has taught me to never give up, even when I’m struggling or sick and that I always need to give 110 percent on the field and in life.,” she said. “I’m very happy with where I am now and how far I’ve come along.”