Praying for Eva (and Katie)

Internet world, it has been a bit of a crazy week. I would say I had a complete PTSD breakdown. I happened across a family on Instagram with a seven year old named Eva. Two weeks ago she had a freak accident, fell off of a golf cart and had a traumatic brain injury. I’ve been following along on the posts as her parents have expressed great faith in God to heal their sweet daughter while wrestling with what is happening medically.

The dad posted last night, “Today was a very difficult day. There are no big changes with Eva, but the conversations the doctors are now having with us feel like I’m taking punch after punch until I can barely stand.
Fair warning, I’m gonna get pretty raw here.

Medically, the doctors are gently saying they essentially believe there’s a good chance Eva will be in a vegetative state for the rest of her life, or close to it. All her movements, they’re saying, are reflexive, not intentional, and the best we could hope for would be some eventual movement of her eyes and limbs…after a year of rehabilitation. They even looked us in the eyes and asked, based on their prediction of her future quality of life, if we’d like to keep her on life-support or not.
I’ve never felt this kind of anger before.
I’m angry at the doctors for having such worst-case-scenario mindsets, I’m angry at myself for feeling so hopeless and clueless and inadequate, but mostly I’m angry at God.
He made Eva so full of life and joy and crazy and fun, why would He allow this freak accident to happen, only to keep her alive…but unable to talk, see, or move? I would much more have preferred for Him to have taken her to wholeness and life with Him the moment she hit her head, rather than keep her body alive but eliminate her spark.
What the heck, God?
I’ve never felt more like I need to sob and also smash everything I can touch than I do today.
I’m out of prayers. I feel like I’ve been praying non-stop for 2 weeks straight and am running on fumes. I mean, Jesus simply spoke healing and life and authority over sickness and death once and people were healed or rose from the dead. Why is God taking so long in answering my prayers? I know and have absolute faith that God is bigger than Eva’s injury, than the atoms in her brain and skull, bigger than brain scans and doctors’ opinions, bigger than the breathing tube still in her throat. I have zero doubt that God could shock this hospital and the world with His power through Eva’s healing…but why isn’t He? And if He’s not going to, why keep Eva around for so long, only to let me (and tens of thousands of others) down? I’m angry and empty and lost and a million miles past confused.
But still trying to hold on to this:

I waited patiently for the Lord to help me,  and he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the pit of despair,  out of the mud and the mire.
He set my feet on solid ground  and steadied me as I walked along.
He has given me a new song to sing,  a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see what he has done and be amazed.  They will put their trust in the Lord. – Psalm 40:1-3 *I also want to say, regardless of how my faith is being tested, the medical professionals (doctors, nurses, specialists, etc.) have all been fantastic. I fully understand they are doing their job and doing with such love and care for Eva and us. I have zero resentment or frustration with them, just frustration with the reality of our world challenging my faith.

Sound familiar? I could have written this 3 years ago. I think I did! Watching these posts pop up has forced me to walk through the trauma of such a horrendous diagnosis all over again. Its also made me walk through them again as a bystander and pray for all of the same things but for a seven year old.

I took Judah to see Katie yesterday. We sat with her, listened to worship music, and I updated her on her kids first days of school. I told her about Eva and she nodded when I asked if shed like to pray for her. Shocking-the tears flowed all over again. Its a holy place, sitting with Katie, wrecked by a brain injury, as we pray for Eva still in a coma for her brain injury. Holy, and beautiful, and so. very. hard.

I stand three years later, still wondering why Katie and now Eva haven’t sprung out of their hospital beds, healed miraculously and completely. Still, I know God is there with them in those beds, it’s His angels all around them. He is sometimes so hard to see but other days its clear. He was there when Katie’s tracheotomy came out when the doctors said it wouldn’t. He was there when her vocal chords started making sounds when the doctors said they wouldn’t. He was there when she started writing, when the doctors said shed never wake up. He’s been there all along. It doesn’t look how I want it to. But HE IS THERE for it anyway.

Take a minute today, please! Pray for Eva to wake up and talk! And as always, pray for our Katie to be restored.

Here is a picture of Katie a few months ago with her daughter in her lap for one of the first times since her brain injury. (thank you botox for strengthening her muscles!)