Michelle Brooks’s Road to Recovery

As some of you may know, our stylist Michelle Brooks and her husband Brian welcomed their second child - a beautiful, healthy baby girl, Nora Belle, on the 5th of December. Michelle was discharged two days later and was able to return home. However, on December 8th, our Michelle was having trouble breathing and returned to the ER, where she was re-admitted to the hospital for further evaluation. Shortly after, doctors confirmed that Michelle had contracted the COVID-19 virus.

She immediately began treatment at Hinsdale Hospital, but the virus escalated quickly and turned into a severe case of pneumonia. After two weeks of receiving care at Hinsdale, her condition worsened. She required emergency transfer to Rush Hospital in downtown Chicago on December 23rd to undergo more aggressive therapy to give her the best chance of full recovery. She was placed on ECMO support upon arrival to help her lungs heal and has been undergoing several different treatments and therapies over the last 5 weeks to help her regain strength and clear her lungs following the damage caused by COVID-19 and pneumonia. Michelle has been responding well to her treatments and continues to improve every day.

Unfortunately, Michelle has been away from home for nearly 8 weeks now. She has not held her newborn Nora since she was three days old, and she misses her babies, husband and family tremendously. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, she has also not been allowed to have any visitors during this time.

It may very well still be 4-6 weeks before Michelle can return home. She still has a very long road ahead of her, and we want to help. After receiving numerous inquiries from her clients and so many others, we decided to set up this GoFundMe page for her and her family. Her husband has not been able to return to work full-time during this time due to caring for both of their children, and the medical bills and financial obligations are adding up daily. We wanted to do something that would benefit the family to help ease their stress during such a difficult time.

If you know Michelle, you know how much of a giver she is, so please join us in helping her and her family get through this difficult time.

Thank you all very much for the support.

Sincerely,

Michelle's Studio 209 Family