Former state Rep. Maggie O’Neil has found a bone marrow donor, marking a significant development for the Saco native who was diagnosed in December with acute myeloid leukemia.
O’Neil’s medical team found a potential match earlier this month through the bone marrow donor registry after her younger brother was not a close match. O’Neil, 35, does not know the person who agreed to donate, with the transplant starting April 16 at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.
O’Neil has been at home after undergoing several rounds of chemotherapy at Maine Medical Center and said she expects four to six weeks of treatment followed by additional weekly appointments in Boston. She hopes to meet her donor and called the update “exciting.”
“It’s kind of hard to wrap your head around it,” she said Friday.
O’Neil received the diagnosis for the rare cancer known as AML in December 2024 after the Democrat finished her fourth term in the Maine House of Representatives and shifted her focus to practicing civil rights and labor law. AML starts in the blood-forming cells of the bone marrow and is particularly uncommon in younger people.
Family, friends and former State House colleagues have supported O’Neil since December. Her father, Chris, who is also a former state representative, made a Facebook post that more than 1,300 people shared featuring a link to the national bone marrow donor registry.
Friends also started a “Maggie’s Journey” Facebook page and a GoFundMe that has raised more than $45,000 to help with treatment costs.
O’Neil, who was the youngest woman in the Legislature when first elected at age 27 in 2016, has been doing physical therapy to prepare for the transplant, walking “a lot of laps” in the hospital and also strolling around her neighborhood and the beach in Saco.
She has continued to feel “really supported by family and friends” while also enjoying the company of her mother’s 5-month-old puppy, Walter, as she has to otherwise avoid crowds and certain hobbies such as gardening.
“He’s very, very fun,” O’Neil said of Walter. “He loves fetch.”
