Stephanie Headley thought she was getting her life back.
The 48-year-old mother of four has systemic scleroderma – a rare, auto-immune disease that is slowly scarring her internal organs. It is fatal, but there is a cure - a very expensive stem cell therapy offered in Chicago.
Headley couldn’t afford it on her own, but in July of 2014 an anonymous donor heard of her plight and gave her $128,000 to cover the costs. Headley called him her angel. “I just started crying,” she said at the time.
But the life-saving miracle was not to be. On a recent trip to Chicago for preliminary testing Headley learned her heart is already too scarred to withstand the demanding treatment. “We didn’t qualify, and that was that,” she says. “I was stunned. I was shocked, saddened. Just complete disbelief.”
“Coming back from Chicago was a real tough, tough drive,” says her father Peter Headley. “It took us two weeks to get over it.”
Now Headley has opened up about her devastating news. And she’s not giving up. She plans to use the donation to pay for other treatments not covered by OHIP. Treatments she hopes that, at the very least, will extend her life. “Buying me, you know, even a few more years with my kids, which was my original goal, to be with my kids as long as I can.”
She couldn't return the money even if she wanted to. To this day, she's never met her mysterious donor.
She’s also become an advocate for stem cell therapy and research. She hopes more people can receive this life-saving treatment even if she can’t.
“I might not have gotten my stem cell transplant but maybe the plan all along was to bring the emphasis to the stem cell transplant program and to save so many lives,” she says. “And if that is the good that's come of this I couldn't be happier.”
