A couple of mothers who decided to have a second baby ended up adding to their family more than expected.
Heather Langley, 39, and Priscilla Rodriguez, 35, live in Odessa in the state of Texas, United States, and they have been living together for nine years. The two were mothers of three-year-old little Sawyer, but they wanted to complete the family with another baby. However, life gave them a surprise, and in August of last year, Heather gave birth to not one, but five babies, all girls.
This is how Hadley, Reagan, Zariah, Zylah, and Jocelyn became, with their birth, the second set of quintuplets to come into the world in the United States. It is only the second time recorded in the US that quintuplets have been pregnant, with all the babies being girls.
They underwent ᴀʀᴛɪꜰɪᴄɪᴀʟ ɪɴsᴇᴍɪɴᴀᴛɪᴏɴ ᴛʀᴇᴀᴛᴍᴇɴᴛ and Heather, who was carrying the pregnancy, found out at six weeks that she was expecting five daughters.
“I immediately got scared when we found out there were going to be five because I was afraid my pregnancy would be worrying and complicated,” Heather said. “I also panicked about how we would take care of five babies and how we would choose and remember their names.”
“However, after the initial sʜᴏᴄᴋ and news, I realized how special and unique our babies were going to be. It seemed to me that we had won the lottery,” added the woman.
Because of the C.O.V.I.D-19 ᴘᴀɴᴅᴇᴍɪᴄ, Priscilla could not accompany her partner to the hospital for her first check-up. Because of this, she learned from a distance of the fivefold surprise that she had for herself to give Heather. “When she received my text message with the news, she replied: ‘Please tell me it’s a joke.’ She was incredibly sʜᴏᴄᴋed,” Heather said.
Then, the two women realized that their daughters would be the second litter of quintuplets in their country, after the Busby quintuplets, who came into the world in April 2015 in Houston, also in the state of Texas.
The birth was brought forward, and what was expected to happen on November 2 happened in August, when the pregnancy was 28 weeks old. The five babies were born by ᴄᴀᴇsᴀʀᴇᴀɴ sᴇᴄᴛɪᴏɴ and had to spend the first three months of life in the hospital.
Heather and Priscilla with their oldest daughter, Sawyer, who received her five little sisters with great love. “It’s been crazy, hectic and exhausting, but we wouldn’t change it for anything. Our oldest daughter has been nothing short of amazing to her sisters, and she even refers to them as her babies. Everything is very nice,” said the woman, taking stock of the first months of living with the little ones.
