Catie Wilkins was the firstborn child of Tre’ and Jenny Wilkins. A slight gross motor delay led to an eventual diagnosis of medulloblastoma, an aggressive brain tumor, on her first birthday. Catie and her family were plunged into a world of doctors and surgeries and chemotherapies and medicines with little warning.

Catie’s treatments included twelve surgeries, four different chemotherapy protocols and six weeks of radiation. Her tumor continued to persist and eventually grow even through very harsh treatments. She battled cancer for three years and four months before succumbing to a common virus due to an immune system that was compromised because of chemotherapy.

Catie battled cancer for most of her life, but more importantly, she lived FULL for her entire life. Often people who hear that she fought this wretched disease for all but her first year feel that she must have had a rough existence. Folks who think this did not know Catie. She crammed a whole lot of living and fun and laughter into her all too short four years and nearly four months.

Catie was funny and tough, loving and mischievous. She was quick to tease her daddy and you should have heard her laugh when she pulled something off on him. Her favorite place on earth was the beach where sheloved to catch hermit crabs and play in the sand. She was an animal lover, with dogs and tree frogs topping her list of favorites.

It’s impossible to capture the essence of Catie in just a few words. She was, in some ways, just a normal kid. But she was an old soul with a wisdom beyond her years. Those who knew and loved Catie were forever changed by the enormity of her spirit and determination to live FULL in spite of what life threw at her.