Sunday, August 3, 2008

August - Prayers for Cate

Dear Lord - Thank you for blessing Cate with the miracle of life. We thank you for all you have done for her and we thank you for the blessing of having her in our lives. After hearing this most recent, and painful, news about the damage done to her frontal lobes, we reach to you again. We ask for your extra blessing on this very important part of her brain, and we pray that she will grow into the beautiful girl you have planned. Amen.




Dear Family, Friends and friends of our family and friends,

Five years ago this month, Cate beat the odds and came home from the hospital. Her future was uncertain, but her survival was nothing short of miraculous. Despite a very bleak medical prognosis, she lived, and has moved on to talk, walk, sing and dance her way back into this world. We know that she beat the odds because she has had wonderful medical care, the support of family and friends, but more importantly she had an amazing number of people praying for her those first few months. We believe in the power of prayer – we have seen it’s results.

Yesterday, our family met with a Neuropsychologist at Children’s Hospital in Boston. Our goal was to learn more about how Cate’s brain works, and what we can do to help overcome the behavior challenges that seem to be getting in the way on her path to recovery. The doctor confirmed, with a voice that cracked with emotion, Cate IS a miracle and, based on the significant damage done to her brain, her progress is nothing short of amazing. However, no matter how hard she tried to make the meeting upbeat and positive, the prognosis is, once again, very bleak. The frontal lobes of Cate’s brain have been very badly damaged. As these lobes are the last to develop, and become increasingly more important in our lives, it will become harder and harder for Cate to filter the world around her and learn even simple things like socializing, playing with peers, and learning math.

So we find ourselves in the same spot we were 5 years ago, a very bleak medical diagnosis that our hearts refuse to believe. We have the medical team in place, same as last time, but we are once again asking for your prayers. In honor of the month she came home, we hope that you could take a few minute each day in August and say a little prayer for Cate. We ask that you please thank God for all the amazing things he has already done for her, but if possible, could he please send a little extra blessing to those ever important frontal lobes.

We ask that if you are comfortable with sending this along to other friends and family we may have missed, please do so… the more people praying in the month of August the better. Whatever you feel comfortable doing will mean the world to us.

Thank you and God Bless,

The Fleury Family
Audra, Dave, Ben and Cate