CASPER, Wyo. — Over a dozen communities in Wyoming are hosting prayer vigils on Friday night for 7-year-old Olivia Blackmer, the sole survivor of an apparant murder-suicide in a small town in Big Horn County on Monday.
According to a verified GoFundMe for Olivia, continues to receive care for the traumatic brain injury in Salt Lake City. Updates in the last day indicate that Olivia was spared damage to the blood vessels in her brain, and doctors are continuing to treat swelling and fluctuations in her vital. They thanked Big Horn County authorities for the quick response that gave her her a fighting chance.
In Casper, advertising manager Abby Roich and CY Middle School cooking instructor Jamie Anderson organized an hour-long prayer gathering to be held in 17 communities simultaneously on Friday night.
“I believe in the power of prayer,” Roich told Oil City News at David Street Station, where Casper’s gathering was held.
“Tonight is about prayers for Olivia, for the swelling in her brain to go down,” Anderson said. “And it’s twofold: it’s about coming together as a community and as a state to show people who are going through a tragedy that they are not alone.”
About a dozen people were at David Street Station, sitting in contemplation or writing prayers for Olivia by electric candlelight on the stage.
Anderson said she knew Olivia was on the minds of people across the state, even if they couldn’t attend a gathering on the busy Valentine’s Day.
Roich and Anderson said the tragedy is also a call to action.
Postpartum depression, a reported factor in the tragedy, can be particularly hard to fathom and talk about, Roich said.
Staying connected and healthy is also key: “We need to be well-fed, we need to rest, we need social connection,” Anderson said.
Anderson recalled her own experience with personal grief and how small gestures like her students leaving her brownies gave her “slivers” of hope.
In a statement announcing the event, Roich wrote, “Although our country in general feels divided, I know in my bones that as Wyomingites we can put all things aside and create some good out of this.”
