Current:Home > Markets'One in a million': Alabama woman pregnant with 2 babies in 2 uteruses due on Christmas -ClearPath Finance
'One in a million': Alabama woman pregnant with 2 babies in 2 uteruses due on Christmas
View
Date:2025-04-15 22:46:03
An Alabama woman born with two uteruses recently got the shock of her life: She's due to deliver a baby from each of her wombs on Christmas day.
Kelsey Hatcher, 32, learned of her condition, known as uterus didelphys, when she was 17 but it hasn't impacted her life until now.
She and her husband Caleb, who live just outside of Birmingham in Dora, already had three kids and thought they were done having children when she learned she was pregnant in May, Hatcher first shared with TODAY.
"There’s only one baby in there, right?" she joked with her doctor at her eight-week ultrasound.
"As soon as she moved the ultrasound wand across my belly, I said, 'Oh my gosh, there’s another one. Oh my gosh.' She said, 'Yes! There is,'" the expectant mom told TODAY. "I was just in complete shock and think for the first, I don’t know, two to three weeks, my husband and I just laughed."
Hatcher spoke with USA TODAY on Wednesday and shared her progress, how she's feeling and how she plans on life with two newborns and three other children.
See also:Louisiana couple gives birth to rare 'spontaneous' identical triplets
How rare is Kelsey Hatcher's pregnancy?
The pregnancy is "one in a million," Dr. Richard Davis told WVTM-TV in Alabama.
Davis is a maternal and fetal medicine specialist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham's Women & Infants Center, where Hatcher is due to deliver on Christmas day.
Hatcher's pregnancy is so uncommon, "some OB/GYNs go their whole careers without seeing anything like this," Dr. Shweta Patel, an OB/GYN who is part of a team of doctors preparing for Hatcher's delivery, told WVTM-TV.
It's "very, very rare," Patel said.
Hatcher's pregnancy is a first for the team at the hospital. They're relying on "baseline teaching and baseline knowledge," Patel told Good Morning America.
While twin pregnancies aren't rare, Hatcher's type is because she ovulated separately, with each egg traveling down each side of the uterus and the sperm traveling up each uterus, and fertilization occurring in both.
"Because my cycles have always worked together as one, I assumed as I ovulated on one side ... and there would be no chance of having a baby in the opposite uterus," Hatcher told USA TODAY. "I never would have thought I would ovulate from both at the same time."
How is Kelsey Hatcher feeling?
Hatcher's doctors have shared the risks of miscarriage or preterm labor with her, but so far, so good.
"Overall, I am feeling great," she told USA TODAY. "I’m definitely slowing down and feeling the toughness of pregnancy. However, I’ve continued to work my job as a massage therapist and kept myself active in the gym at least four days a week. I believe those are huge contributors to my feeling so well for so long."
At 35 weeks, both babies are developing normally. The tricky part will be delivery, as it's unclear whether or not the babies will arrive around the same time.
Pregnant while already pregnant?It's rare, but it can happen.
What can Kelsey Hatcher expect for delivery
When Hatcher goes into labor, Davis said that her medical team will have to monitor each uterus to see which is contracting, "and if they’re doing sort of almost the same or they’re different."
One baby could be born vaginally and the other via C-section.
"It's so unpredictable, and that's why we've had a lot of conversations with Kelsey kind of talking about the different scenarios that could happen," Patel said.
It's possible only one uterus will contract. The other may not follow until weeks after.
Are the babies considered twins then? Since Hatcher's situation is such a medical anomaly, doctors don't have any other way of describing it "besides still calling them twins," Patel said.
Hatcher's concern isn't so much about delivery, but the family dynamic after the babies arrive and how she'll manage everything with the couple's other three children, who are 2, 4 and 7.
"The thought of managing five children, two being newborns, is an overwhelming feeling for me," she told USA TODAY. "I’m preparing to just take it one day at a time and do the best I can."
veryGood! (233)
Related
- Paige Bueckers vs. Hannah Hidalgo highlights women's basketball games to watch
- Hundreds of dogs sickened with mysterious, potentially fatal illness in several U.S. states
- Thanksgiving cocktails and mocktail recipes: Festive flavors featuring apple, cranberry, pumpkin
- A cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe is suspected of killing more than 150 and is leaving many terrified
- 'No Good Deed': Who's the killer in the Netflix comedy? And will there be a Season 2?
- Hundreds of OpenAI workers threaten to quit unless Sam Altman is reinstated as CEO
- Musk’s X sues liberal advocacy group Media Matters over its report on ads next to hate groups’ posts
- Zach Wilson 'tackled' by Robert Saleh before being benched by Jets head coach
- Megan Fox's ex Brian Austin Green tells Machine Gun Kelly to 'grow up'
- Experts say a wall that collapsed and killed 9 in the Dominican Republic capital was poorly built
Ranking
- US wholesale inflation accelerated in November in sign that some price pressures remain elevated
- Biden celebrates his 81st birthday with jokes as the White House stresses his experience and stamina
- A cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe is suspected of killing more than 150 and is leaving many terrified
- Years after Parkland massacre, tour freshens violence for group of House lawmakers
- NHL in ASL returns, delivering American Sign Language analysis for Deaf community at Winter Classic
- Kansas keeps lead, Gonzaga enters top 10 of USA TODAY Sports men's college basketball poll
- Kansas keeps lead, Gonzaga enters top 10 of USA TODAY Sports men's college basketball poll
- When and where to watch the 2023 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, plus who's performing
Recommendation
Justice Department, Louisville reach deal after probe prompted by Breonna Taylor killing
911 call center says its misidentified crossing before derailment of Chicago-bound Amtrak train
Judge Rules A$AP Rocky Must Stand Trial in Shooting Case
Gisele Bündchen Reflects on Importance of Kindness Amid Silent Struggles
Romantasy reigns on spicy BookTok: Recommendations from the internet’s favorite genre
Jury acquits Catholic priest in Tennessee who was charged with sexual battery
OSHA finds plant explosion that killed 1 person could have been prevented
Why is Angel Reese benched? What we know about LSU star as she misses another game