After Two Years of Pain and Courage, Heaven Gained a Little Warrior Named Avery.

Avery Lafferty has passed away after a thirty–month battle with DMG — an aggressive and devastating brain cancer that no child should ever have to face.
She was just twelve years old.

For two and a half years, Avery lived between hope and heartbreak, courage and pain.
And yet, through every hospital stay, every scan, every seizure, and every sleepless night, she refused to let cancer take her spirit.

She was a fighter — not just in the way she endured, but in the way she lived.

She loved football, always cheering loudest for her team.
She was full of energy, kindness, and compassion — a child who could make anyone smile with a single glance.

To know Avery was to feel warmth, to feel life itself.

Her parents called her their cancer rebel.
Because she didn’t let the disease define her — she defied it.

There were days when the pain was unbearable, when her body grew weak, when words became whispers.

And still, she smiled.
Still, she fought back.
Still, she looked at her family and somehow found a way to say, “I’m okay.”

Over the years, Avery endured things most adults couldn’t imagine.
Countless needles.
Endless tests.

MRI scans that blurred days into nights.
Side effects that stole her balance, her energy, her peace — but never her light.

Through it all, she showed a strength beyond her years.
Her resilience inspired everyone who knew her.

And when she couldn’t speak, her eyes did.
They said, “Don’t give up on me. I’m not done fighting yet.”

Just days before her passing, Avery suffered another seizure — one that left her unresponsive.
Her family and doctors gathered around her, hearts trembling between hope and fear.
They prayed for a miracle, whispered her name, and held onto faith that she might once again do what she had done so many times before — beat the odds.

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But this time, the battle was too heavy.
Her little body had fought for far too long.

On July 14th, Avery’s fight came to an end.
She passed away in her parents’ arms, surrounded by love, in the quiet comfort of home.

There was no pain.

No fear.
Just peace — the kind she had earned a thousand times over.

Her mother later wrote, with heartbreak too deep for words:

“Nothing could prepare us to hold her and look into her eyes as she took her last breath.”

Those final moments — tender, sacred — were both an ending and a beginning.
An ending to the pain.
A beginning of a legacy that will never fade.

Avery fought for more than two and a half years with unimaginable bravery.

And through it all, she never once complained.
Even when her body was tired, she found ways to make others smile.

Even when the world seemed unfair, she found reasons to laugh.

She showed her family how to be strong.

How to keep going.
How to love harder, even in the face of loss.

Her parents said, “We need to learn from her — and do the same.”

Because Avery’s courage didn’t end with her story.
It continues in every life she touched, every heart she healed.

Her friends and family — and the community who called themselves

Avery’s Little Army — stood by her every step of the way.
They prayed.
They raised their voices, sent messages, wore bracelets, and spread hope across towns and timelines.

Avery felt it all — the love, the strength, the belief.

It carried her farther than medicine ever could.

And now, that army will live on.
Her family plans to turn Avery’s Little Army into a charity — to help other children facing cancer, to give hope where hope is fading, and to keep her fight alive.

Because that’s what Avery would want — for her story to help others, for her strength to ripple outward like light.

Her parents wrote one final message:

“In the end, our lives aren’t just measured in years — they’re measured in the lives of people we touch.

In that respect, Avery will live for an eternity, and maybe beyond.”

Avery’s twelve short years were more powerful than a lifetime.
She taught love through pain, courage through fear, joy through suffering.
She changed people — simply by being who she was.

And though she’s gone, her laughter still echoes.
Her light still shines.
And her spirit — wild, fierce, and free — will forever soar beyond the clouds.

Fly high, sweet Avery.
You’ve earned your wings.
You are forever loved.