Daughter is better, thanks for your prayers

Last week Claudia Johnson Brown's 31-year-old daughter was hospitalized in intensive care, unable to breathe. She asked classmates to pray for her daughter. Yesterday we got this email from Claudia, through her friend, Paula Widstrom:

I can't tell you how overwhelmed we are by your support, love and prayers.
For the phone calls, cards, hugs, e-mails, and the warm feeling that we get when we see Gretchen's eyes open and know the power of prayer and love got her through.
She is on so many prayer chains that she had to come out of this. My high school class, people I worked with in previous jobs, and people I knew back in Texas were praying. One of the nurses asked her if she knew how lucky she was to be alive. She wasn't lucky, she was blessed. Now she knows how close we came to loosing her again.
There has to be a reason why she keeps beating the odds.
Gretchen is off all machinery except a nasal tube and an apnea monitor at night. She finally ate some food today after not having anything since Tuesday of last week. She kept it down and was looking for more.
Now she can get her strength back. Her throat is still a little sore and she talks very quietly, which isn't bad. It sure beats trying to do sign language around wires and tubes.
Tomorrow she is going to be moved out of intensive care and into a room on the regular ward. She is looking forward to that big time. She can have a phone again. She can also have visitors and get the backlog of flowers they weren't able to deliver to her in ICU. Hopefully she will be able to go home soon.
Claudia