HOUSTON -- Andrea Yates wrote a note Thursday and handed it to her attorney, George Parnham, who read it during Friday's news conference after she was sentenced to life in prison.

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Listen To Yates' Note

In the note, she thanked the psychiatrists who testified on her behalf, her attorneys, and the people on her treatment team.

She also thanked her family, "To my family Rusty, Mom, her brothers, Patrick, Brian, and Andy, her sister, Michelle, Rusty's mom, Dora, she thanks them for their love and support," Parnham said.

"And she writes a note to her dear friend, Debbie for (their) special friendship," Parnham said.

"She thanks God for all the prayers from mothers, and she tells her family that she loves them and that she is sorry for the pain that she has caused them," he said.

"She notes that she regrets that this illness brought her to a place where she was capable of killing her own children.

"Noah, he was my first born. He was so inquisitive and his favorite thing to do was hatching monarch butterflies.

"John, with his cute grin, he loved to do crafts and was very enthusiastic.

"Precious Paul, nurturing and loving, he sought to please us, and be special friends to his brothers.

"Beautiful Luke, trying to keep up with his brothers, he also was nurturing, especially to his baby sister.

"And beautiful Mary, such a loving baby, with the big blue eyes.

"I thank God that I was blessed with such a precious family," Parham said Andrea Yates wrote.

"Those are unsolicited comments on the part of Andrea Yates, which speaks so significantly and so deeply to how she feels and felt about her children, and the terrible illness that beset her, that caused her, to take their lives," he said.