Ciara Says Russell Wilson Convinced a Dying Teen with ’12 Hours to Live’ to Stick with Treatment — and He’s Now in Remission

Ciara says husband Russell Wilson helped convince a teenager with leukemia to stick with stem cell therapy by telling him about his father — and ended up saving his life.

“You talk about being able to be a part of saving someone’s life essentially, right? It’s such a gift,” the Grammy-winning singer, 39, told Power 106 Los Angeles on Wednesday, Sept. 10, during an appearance at the station’s studios.

While discussing her and Wilson’s nonprofit children’s foundation, Why Not You, Ciara shared the story of Wilson’s encounter with Milton Wright, then a 19-year-old who was struggling with his third round of leukemia.

Wilson, now 36, she said, “convinced this kid” to stick with stem cell therapy. She explained, ”This kid did not want to try it. He had twelve hours left to live.”

“Russ went in and talked to him and convinced him, ‘Hey, kid,’ told him his story about losing his father, everything. Before you know it, the kid changed his mind, got up and was like, ‘I want to do it,’ ” Ciara shared.

Wilson’s father, Harrison, died in 2010 at age of 55 from diabetes complications. The New York Giants quarterback wrote about what he told Wright in The Player’s Tribune, where he explained that Wright had had a bad reaction to stem cell therapy — what Wilson described as the “final option” to save Wright’s life — and was considering stopping the treatment.  

Wright told him that his father had lost his ability to walk and see, but when doctors told him he had 24 hours left to live, “he kept on fighting for two more years.”

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“I told Milton to keep fighting like my dad did,” Wilson wrote, adding that the teenager went into remission.

As Ciara explained, “Before you know it, the kid changed his mind. Got up was like, ‘I want to do it.’ Now fast forward to this kid is in the hospital telling other kids to try it.”

“You think about, like, the power in that,” Ciara continued said. “It’s such a blessing and we’re just really big on encouraging people to have a ‘Why Not You’ attitude because we still have to tap into that ourselves. We know the power of that, right? Why Not You? It’s real special to us, real near and dear to our hearts.”