The Challenge’s Melinda Collins Welcomes Baby After Miscarriage


Matt and Melinda Collins
Courtesy Melinda Collins/Instagram

A new challenge! MTV’s Melinda Collins (née Stolp) and husband Matt CollinsAfter struggling with fertility, they welcomed their second child.

“Introducing Hayden Thomas to the world! 🥹💙,” the Challenge alum, 39, captioned her baby boy’s Instagram debut on Thursday, October 6, sharing a trio of photos from the hospital.

Host T.J. LavinYou can send well-wishes to happy couple via the comments section. Challenge alums. “Great name! Hayden, welcome to the world! Congrats guys!!!” three-time winner Derrick Kosinski gushed.

The Challenge's Melinda Stolp Welcomes 2nd Baby With Husband Matt Collins After Miscarriage
Courtesy Melinda Collins/Instagram

“Hellllo Hayden!!!!!! Uncle Nehemiah will see you soon 🥹,” theReal World: Austin‘s Nehemiah Clark added.

Collins and Melinda had baby No. 2 are on the way. “Excited for the newest chapter in our life! #boymom,” she wrote via Instagram alongside a letter board ready, “Red, white and lots of blue! Baby Collins is a boy. Making his debut in October 2022.”

Camden, the couple’s son, was born in November 2019. They previously announced in February 2021 that they were planning to have a girl. Melinda lost her pregnancy one month later.

“Monday, I had my 20 week anatomy ultrasound and that’s when we found out she was gone,” the reality TV personality wrote in a heartbreaking Instagram post in March 2021. “I have so many questions as to why? This pain should never be experienced by a woman. No man should have to go through this pain also, because even though my husband wasn’t carrying or delivering her, this was his baby too and I know he is hurting as much as I am.”

She reflected on having to “endure the pain of contractions” without getting to bring her baby home. “Life is hard… Life can really suck sometimes,” the Wisconsin native continued. “Seeing her tiny little perfectly formed features and knowing I’ll never get to kiss her or feel her heart beat against my chest while rocking her to sleep. My husband doesn’t get to have a daddy’s girl who has him wrapped around her finger.”

After her miscarriage, Melinda competed — and became a finalist — on The Challenge: All Stars 2.This program aired on August 20, 2021.

“It’s so crazy because I lost my daughter when I was five months pregnant. I would say three weeks after that, one of the talent coordinators had contacted me and said, ‘I know that you’re really going through something, but is this something you’d be interested in doing?’” the Real WorldExclusively told by alum Us WeeklyIn November 2021. “I’ve had quite the year. It was, like, the universe tapping me on my shoulder. ‘This is something you should do.’”

Melinda, the first to appear on Fresh Meat2006: She was candid about her loss, before she returned to camera. All Stars 3This was earlier in the year.

“I do believe that it will get out there and that’s the coolest thing. Like, obviously I went through something that was just devastating and hard, but there’s a lot of people who go through it and do it alone,” she told Use. “So I hope that through my journey that I’m able to help some people that way too.”