A Nigerian couple who tried for nearly two decades to start a family has welcomed a set of sextuplets in Richmond, Virginia.
Adeboye and Ajibola Taiwo reportedly tried for 17 years to have children before learning they were expecting six babies in January.
“I was excited,” said dad Adeboye Taiwo. “For the very first time we were expecting.”
The babies, three boys and three girls were born prematurely on May 11 weighing between 1 pound, 10 ounces, to 2 pounds, 15 ounces, according to VCU Medical Center in Richmond, Virginia. Adeboye was 30 weeks and 2 days pregnant when she delivered the six babies. “We’re going through this extraordinary journey together with the family,” Ronald Ramus, M.D., director of the Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at VCU Medical Center, said in the hospital’s press release. “It’s not every day that parents bring home sextuplets. Mrs. Taiwo was eating, sleeping and breathing for seven. A lot of the support and encouragement we gave her to make it as far as she did was important, and one of the biggest contributions we made as a team.”
“We’re going through this extraordinary journey together with the family,” Ronald Ramus, M.D., director of the Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at VCU Medical Center, said in the hospital’s press release. “It’s not every day that parents bring home sextuplets. Mrs. Taiwo was eating, sleeping and breathing for seven. A lot of the support and encouragement we gave her to make it as far as she did was important, and one of the biggest contributions we made as a team.”
The Taiwos are thankful for the level of care they have received and hope their children are able to give back in the same way when they are older.
“I hope for the smallest of my six children to grow up and say, ‘I was so small, and look at me now,’” said Ajibola Taiwo. “I want my kids [to] come back to VCU to study and learn to care for others with the same people who cared for me and my family.”
Ajibola was discharged from the hospital May 18, but the babies will remain in the NICU at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU until they are strong enough to eat and breathe on their own. All six babies are “doing well and continue to thrive” in the NICU, according to VCU.
“This is an amazing medical accomplishment that would not be possible without the outstanding coordination of our obstetrics and neonatal teams,” said Russell Moores, M.D., medical director of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU. “While our level 4 NICU cares for the region’s most critically ill and premature babies every day, it’s humbling to help the Taiwos’ new family survive and thrive. Given their prematurity, they are doing exceptionally well, but should they require subspecialty care, we have all that they could need at CHoR.”
The family is far from home so it’s not known what their plan will be when the babies are able to be released. For now, they are happy to have such a specialized medical team looking after their children.
