Elizabeth M’s Story

Elizabeth & Alex were married in 2017, and knew they were ready to start their family immediately.

Elizabeth has PCOS, and her doctor put her on clomid right away. After a few failed rounds, she was sent to a reproductive endocrinologist where she discovered her hormones were a little crazy.

She had a partial thyroidectomy, which ended up being thyroid cancer. With the surgery clearing it out, they were soon given the okay to start trying to conceive again. After taking letrozole to help induce ovulation, they fell pregnant with their first child.

At 21.5 weeks – Elizabeth’s water broke (PPROM – preterm premature rupture of membranes) when she was at work. They surpassed the doctors expectations, and made it a few days, but on the day he turned 22 weeks, on October 6th, 2018, their sweet son, Theodore “Teddy” Russell Michalski, was born sleeping.

After a returning cancer surgery and taking time to grieve, they decided to try and give Teddy a sibling on earth, their rainbow. And they did – two high risk pregnancies gave Teddy a little brother, Nathan, and a little sister, Delilah. He’s always watching over them.

Elizabeth has started a nonprofit in Teddy’s memory, called A Touch of Teddy, sending teddy bear ornaments to families who’ve experienced pregnancy/infant loss. These ornaments are free in the month of October for pregnancy/infant loss awareness month, and for Teddy’s birthday.