Madison & Jasmine's Birth Story

My identical twin daughters were born on August 22, 1997. They are now five years old and the light of my life. Their birth was the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me and I still get tears in my eyes just thinking about it.

My first sonogram was done at seven weeks. I was sick and in the hospital because I was dehydrated. They could only see one yolk sac at this stage and they said that the baby was okay. Well, my pregnancy continued just fine, but at about four months I began retaining water so bad that I had to buy new shoes. My doctor told me this was not normal (I had gained seven pounds in a week) and sent me for another sonogram on May 21, 1997. By then I was nearly five and a half months along. The nurse began to do the sonogram, looked at the screen for a minute and then said "Hold on, I'll be right back."

I looked at the screen and it said "Baby A." "Well", I thought, "Sure, that means this is my first pregnancy and my first baby."

She came back with another nurse and they both began looking at the screen, which was now turned away from me. The second girl then asked me, "Are you excited about having a baby?"

"Yes." I replied, smiling.

"Would you be excited about having two?" My heart might as well have stopped right then. For some odd reason I'd had this idea that I could not even get pregnant, and now they were telling me that I wasn't only having one baby, I was going to have TWO! I was excited and scared all at the same time.

The weeks went on, and I became bigger and bigger, until turning over in bed became a major task in itself. My mom made sure I ate well, and my husband was as good as could be expected of any man. I went to my appointments every week and it felt like I would never have these babies.

On Monday, Aug 18, the doctor checked the heart beats, told me that they were slower than normal and sent me for a non-stress test. After the test they asked me to come back the next morning for another one, which I did, then they told me to return on Friday for yet another one.

At 11 a.m. on Friday I had another non-stress test, and the doctor told me to go on home and come to his office on Monday. Meanwhile the Labor and Delivery nurses had sent for some blood work and they told me I could leave as soon as it came back, but informed me that they would keep me on the monitor until then. All of a sudden I got the worst headache, (I'd had a lot of those during this pregnancy), things began to look blurry and my blood pressure shot up to 220/90. The doctor returned and told me that both of my babies were breech and that he was going to do an amniocentesis. If it turned out that both the babies´ lungs were developed, he would perform a C-section. I felt disappointed in myself, because I wanted to have these babies naturally, but I knew that it was the safest thing to do.

At 5:15 p.m., four weeks before my due date, Madison Nicole was born weighing four pounds, fifteen ounces. Two minutes later, her sister, Jasmine Marie followed weighing five pounds, one ounce. They were so small, I was sure that I would never be able to care for twins. I nursed them for six weeks and they are now walking, talking, blonde, blue-eyed, gorgeous little girls and I wonder just how in the world I ever managed before I had them.