Update on Erica Harris

SooToday.com received the following update on former Saultite Erica Harris from loyal reader Harley Harris. As reported earlier by SooToday.com, Erica grew up in Sault Ste. Marie as Erica Holmes and graduated from Sir James Dunn in 1995.

SooToday.com received the following update on former Saultite Erica Harris from loyal reader Harley Harris.

As reported earlier by SooToday.com, Erica grew up in Sault Ste. Marie as Erica Holmes and graduated from Sir James Dunn in 1995.

Her mother and grandmother still live in Sault Ste. Marie.

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Dear Friends and Family,

First of all, thank you for your continued support – your prayers, thoughts and support that we have received via texts, emails and facebook have been a continued source of positivity for all of us over the past weeks.

While we haven’t been able to respond to most of you, please know that we have received them and they are much appreciated.

A huge thank you as well to everyone who signed up to be a stem cell/bone marrow donor, here in Canada and around the world, and those who assisted by spreading our plea and organizing/volunteering One Matchdonor drives.

Because of your amazing efforts, we received some great news on Monday that our exceptional BMT Coordinator at VGH, Joanne, working hand in hand with One Match/Canadian Blood Services, found potential stem cell/bone marrow donors for Erica, and we know that all of your efforts to raise awareness and participate in the program were a big help in getting that encouraging news.

However, yesterday we received some other news on Erica’s condition.

The white blood cell "counts" that I referred to in earlier updates were not coming up as expected.

A bone marrow biopsy was done on Monday.

We received the biopsy results yesterday.

While we had hoped that the aggressive round of salvage chemo would clear Erica’s bone marrow and put her in remission for a transplant, we received word that the salvagechemo was not effective.

The doctors found too many leukemia cells in her bone marrow for a stem cell/bone marrow transplant to be effective.

No further conventional treatment options are available to Erica at this time.

We are looking into alternative options but as we determine what the next steps will be, we are not quite ready for visitors.

We would, however, appreciate your positive thoughts, prayers, and good wishes as we continue on our journey.

The VGH Leukemia Group has released Erica from T-15 as an in-patient to do "supportive care" in the out-patient day care unit at VGH which means she gets to spend her nights at home.

We are looking forward to this precious family time on the homefront.

The doctors at VGH gave us estimates of a few months (at most) for us to enjoy Erica and for Erica to enjoy her boys.

We intend to spend as much time as we can together.

No words can describe how devastated we are by this.

I will do my best to keep you updated in the coming weeks.

Faith, Hope and Love Always,

Team Harris

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