Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Mum wants loss of baby to address taboos and help others FOREVER BY STILLBIRTH
Tragedy just days before daughter was due
CHRISTINA Campbell’s Instagram page is packed with excitement and love for her unborn baby.
Images of her blossoming bump, pregnancy style and the journey to meet her second daughter revealed a blessed life and a grateful mum.
But today there are no photos of little Dakota Raine, instead there are messages of thanks to the community who carried the family through the loss of their baby just days before she was due.
Christina, 27, said: “We’ve felt so much love from the community and I’ve had amazing conversations with women who’ve been through the same situation as us. It has been so healing.
“Stillbirth and miscarriages are not topics we hear about a lot and I feel very strongly that we should keep sharing our story with others.”
Dakota was a planned second child for American Christina and her Northern Ireland husband, Adam, and a longed-for sibling to their daughter Olivia, three.
After developing gestational diabetes Christina, from Portstewart, Co Antrim, was carefully monitored during her lockdown pregnancy, and managed well. By week 37, Dakota weighed 10lbs and measured almost two feet long, so a Caesarean section was planned.
And on January 26, with her husband Adam waiting excitedly in the car park of Antrim Area Hospital, Christina was relaxed as she lay back to expose her swollen belly for her scan.
PANIC
But she felt her face prickle with panic as she watched her doctor’s face, and as another doctor was urged to take a look, her world spun off its axis.
Christina said: “We were ready to welcome Dakota Raine, she was due in days, but our big, beautiful, healthy baby who had literally danced her way through my pregnancy, had slipped away. One moment she was spinning and kicking, the next she was gone.
“There were no signs of life, there was no hope. We’d hear no cry as she entered the world because she had gone before she could take a single breath.”
Christina’s husband Adam, 33, was expecting to see Christina walk out of the hospital, happy and waving her scan. Unable to be with her because of Covid regulations, when his phone rang he assumed she was calling to say she was on her way. Instead he heard an unfamiliar voice telling him he was needed.
Christina said: “They brought Adam straight to me and within minutes of hearing Dakota was gone, he was by my side. It was unreal. It felt like the world just stopped. All those hopes and dreams just froze in time. We just sobbed in each other’s arms.
“We discovered afterwards that my placenta had been compromised because of gestational diabetes and no one had caught it.
“The pregnancy had been pretty much perfect, really enjoyable and filled with love and plans. Dakota was really active and I felt we were in for a whirlwind with her arrival.”
On January 22, Christina had her regular phone appointment for diabetes.
She said: “I’d got used to being woken up with Dakota kicking and through the weekend the kicks didn’t feel as powerful.
I called the hospital for advice and was told by the doctor that if I felt her move about 10 times an hour, she was doing great.
“So I waited and I counted and she moved and kept moving and I felt some relief. I was due to have my scan the next day. I just wish I’d gone to get checked that day but something stopped me, I was convinced we were fine and no one in the hospital seemed concerned.
“So when the scan showed she had slipped away, everyone was very shocked. The tears flowed, our hearts broke and we had to arrange to deliver Dakota knowing she was already gone from this world.”
Christina and Adam were sent home with a plan for a natural delivery after the devastating scan on January 26.
Three days later Dakota was born at peace.
Christina said: “Something in me changed quite dramatically. From the visceral pain and devastation of losing Dakota, I still had to bring her into the world.
TERRIFIED
“The doctors wanted me to try naturally because the risk to Dakota was sadly gone, and I was very afraid.
“On that Friday, I walked into the hospital completely terrified at the thought of giving birth naturally. With Olivia, doctors told me my body couldn’t do it and I knew Dakota was bigger.
“Every second leading up to me starting to push was full of fear and anxiety, and then our midwife gently said ‘push’ and something came over me and all the fear disappeared.
“I knew in my heart that I wasn’t going
All those hopes and dreams just froze in time…we just sobbed in each other’s arms CHRISTINA CAMPBELL ON LOSING HER FULL-TERM BABY
to be able to do anything physically for Dakota in this life.
“Holding her in my arms was all I was going to be able to do for my baby girl and that was my only thought. Two and a half hours later, she was in my arms.
“The experience of saying goodbye to her changed me forever and the experience of saying hello to her did the same.
“Days earlier I felt that my body had failed me. I felt that I had failed my baby girl. But, I know that what happened wasn’t my fault or my body’s fault.”
Christina and Adam were able to spend all the time they wanted with Dakota.
She said: “The staff were incredible, kind and compassionate. Dakota arrived at 12.12pm on January 29, 2021, weighing 10lb 3oz and measuring 59 cms.
“She looked perfect. We held her and kissed her, we sang to her and loved her – and then we had to say goodbye for now.
NIGHTMARES
“I determined in that first moment of holding her in my arms that I wouldn’t be angry, that I would allow my body and mind to grieve but I would live to honour our little girl.
“We had to explain to her big sister Olivia, and Dakota is an everyday subject in our home. I feel she changed me for the better, and I want her to help the
FAMILY FIRST Christina Campbell with Adam and Olivia world break down the taboo of baby loss.
“I’m hopeful but I’m also realistic about the trauma. When I sleep the horror of that scan room and the news come back to haunt me.
“My nightmares are filled with panic and that half-wakeful hope that it’s just a dream. But then I wake up and it’s not a dream, we’re still living this.
“But I’m working to stay positive and healthy and we’re raising money in aid of SANDS, the Stillbirth & Neonatal Death Society.
“Dakota Raine only experienced love and comfort and we want to honour our precious daughter, our little friend, ally,
BIG SIS Olivia by the sea with mum
BEACH BLISS
Life on the North Coast singing queen and star girl dancing with the stars. Her dad will run four miles every four hours for 48 hours starting April 23 at 1pm and concluding April 25. “Our lives changed forever in the Antrim Area Hospital and not in the way we’d imagined, but we’re so grateful to the staff there for the love and kindness they showed us as our world blew apart.
“And we also want to show gratitude to SANDS who provide support for the parents and families who’ve experienced a journey like ours.”
You can support the fundraiser for SANDS on www.gofundme. com/f/4-miles-for-dakota-raine