Welcome to Holland......

So, with all that has happened over the past few weeks, I have decided this would be the perfect time to restart my blog. It's so hard to even know where to start, so for now, it will kind of be like a diary that I can post my frustrations, hopes, and all the other fun things that go with having a preemie. 


The title of this blog comes from a story I found on another preemie mommy's blog. 

This pretty much sums up how I am feeling about Colin's birth. For those who know me, I'm a planner. I was trying to have everything about this little baby's birth planned down to the "T". Because we had to go the IVF route, I felt it gave me time to do tons of research. 


So from the beginning, I interviewed 4 doctors, went to 3 hospitals, read 5 books on pregnancy, and had plans to create the "perfect" nursery. Because I had watched the documentary "The Business of Being Born", I had decided that the baby's entrance should be at a birthing center, with no epidural and in a bathtub. For those that think this sounds pretty hippieish, it was. But it was gonna be stylish too! Here is the link to the place:


The Sanctuary


So every month since September, I had been visiting with my midwife, getting ultrasounds when needed to determine that baby was growing ok, and overall trying to adjust to being pregnant. For me, morning sickness started in my 2nd trimester, and it really threw me for a loop. For the past month and a half, I had finally gotten it under control, and my hope was that the rest of the pregnancy would go as planned, with me getting a  nice big belly! Off to Italy we planned!


But little did I know that we would be landing in Holland soon. Because 2 weeks ago, life changed completely. On Friday, November 4th, I noticed a HUGE change in my tummy. Suddenly, it felt like the baby went from 1 pound to 5 pounds! However, a phone call to my midwife that night determined that things were probably ok, so I went to bed thinking it would be ok. 


The next morning at 6am, I started having weird cramping pains. Not knowing they were contractions, but realizing that they were coming pretty often, I decided to time their occurrence. After 30 minutes, I realized they were occurring every 3 minutes. It was then I got a little scared, and after a phone call to my midwife, she urged me to go to the nearest ER. 


So, at this point because we had no OB/GYN, we could literally have gone to any hospital's ER to be seen by a doctor. I did visit 3 hospitals, so I knew what some of my options were. But that morning, Rich made a decision that I believed was spiritually guided. He decided to go to Glendale Adventist. It is one of his clients, so while that might have been the reason he choose it, he also felt that for some reason, that is where we should go. 


So by 7am, I was checked into the maternity ER, and was placed in a bed to wait to see the ER doctor. They hooked us up to a fetal monitor, and we could see the baby's heartbeat was around 150bpm. This was what it had been throughout my pregnancy, so we felt that baby was ok. So we waited. And waited. And waited. And waited.


By 12:30pm, I had reached my waiting limit. I had plans that day! If no one had seen me by then, I thought, "hey, I must be ok". So I told Rich "let's get out of here". When he went over to inform them of my decision, he also tried to see if another doctor might be able to see me, and name dropped a doctor that a friend of ours suggested. The doctor, Selena Lantry, turned out to be right there. She mentioned that protocol dictated that she couldn't look at me once I was assigned to the ER doctor. However, when she came over to tell me that, and saw me ripping off the monitors and trying to get off the bed, she decided to intervene. 


Within minutes, she quickly examined me, and found out that my cervix was dilated to 3cm, and my water bag was bulging out. For some reason, my body was basically having a hard time keeping the baby in. Immediately, she said I was no longer going anywhere, and from now on, I was officially on bed rest in the hospital for the rest of my pregnancy. 


Swallowing that diagnosis was hard. First I was in shock, then sad, then angry, then shock again. And that was the first 2 days. But overall, I knew that our end goal was to have a healthy baby, even if that meant being in the hospital, not allowed to get out of bed AT ALL, and dealing with the mental hardship of it. February 24th due date, here we come! To Italy we go!


But I only lasted a week. Because before I knew it, on Friday November 11, I started having contractions again. By the time the doctor came into to see me around midnight, it was determined that I had dilated a little further, and the water bag was much further down the birth canal. Since the water bag hadn't broken, having an emergency C-section was the best way to ensure his safety. Before I knew it, we met little Colin Victor Campbell at 2:04am. 





So maybe he didn't want to keep being known as a girl. Maybe Heavenly Father wanted to let me know that instead of Italy, we were going to Holland. For whatever the reason, we ended up being parents 3 months early. And that was the beginning of the roller coaster ride in Holland. 


Because as beautiful as it is having a little boy, much like being in "Holland", I still had been wanting to have more pregnancy moments in beautiful "Italy". Like making a cast of my growing belly. Taking family pictures in Cabo for Thanksgiving. Having a fun, gender neutral baby shower. And creating beautiful flying pig murals in the baby's room with Rich. Then having the grand finale in February. Water birth and all.


Now, we are in Holland, and I'm still getting adjusted to where we are at now. And while we can eventually have family pictures in Cabo, or a baby shower soon, pregnancy is over. As "hard" as the pregnancy experience was for me, now, I suddenly find myself wishing I was still pregnant. Because that would mean my baby still had time to grow, and kick and overall be healthy and safe in mommy's tummy. 


I'm finding the beauty though. Hearing myself being called "Mommy", seeing my step-kids decide to have a painting party to finish the mural, having our family at our house for Thanksgiving instead of them wanting to go to Cabo. So while I'll never get a chance to make it all the way to Italy (since this is our last baby), I wouldn't want to be anywhere else but Holland with my little boy.......