Roseau Times-Region - Serving Roseau County for over 100 Years - The Official Roseau County Newspaper

Gavin Arthur Waage, all of four-years-old, doesn't make any claims to being very tough. But he surely is.

Just ask his parents, Kagen and Tasha Waage. They know the score.

For starters, he had his first open heart surgery when he was just five days old.

That surgery was planned after he had been diagnosed via a gestational ultrasound with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (HLHS) when his mother was 30 weeks pregnant.

"They had first noticed something was wrong at 20 weeks," said Tasha. "Gavin was born on 6/16/2012. He's going to be five, and he was born on my birthday."

There is joy in her vo...