To mark Multiple Birth Awareness Week, Sunshine Coast Health is excited to introduce you to twins Eleanor and Xavier, who were born last Monday March 10!
For parents Sam and Tyrone, this pregnancy wasn’t their first. They also have a 2.5-year-old son named Elijah, so when Sam started feeling a bit off she recognised the signs and took a pregnancy test. Well, it was positive!
In the lead up to the first scan, the couple had joked around together, saying ‘imagine if we had twins’…then in the week before the scan, Sam started to feel as though it actually could be.
Dad Tyrone said despite this, it was still a huge surprise when during that scan he thought he was seeing double.
“When we were in the room, I stopped the scan to ask if I was correct in seeing that it was, in fact, twins,” he said.
He was correct – Sam was carrying both a little boy and a little girl.
The couple said Sam thankfully didn’t struggle too much throughout her pregnancy with the twins. The first two trimesters went smoothly without too many issues, and then the third felt a tiny bit harder due to carrying two babies.
In the early hours of March 10, Sam’s waters broke at home in Gympie – just 11 days out from her scheduled c-section date as one baby was breech.
“The waters breaking early was a surprise, but somewhat expected, as our first baby’s waters broke early also,” Tyrone said.
“Everything then seemed to happen so fast.”
During the first stage of labour, a woman’s cervix dilates (opens) from 0-10 centimetres to allow the baby to pass through.
When Sam arrived at Gympie Hospital, she was 2 centimetres dilated. She was rushed to Sunshine Coast University Hospital (SCUH) in an ambulance, and by the time she arrived there she was already 8 centimetres dilated.
Since the baby girl was breech, Sam had an emergency c-section.
Eleanor was born at 5:19am weighing 1.86kg. Brother Xavier was born just a couple of minutes later, weighing 2.75kg.
The sweet duo was keen to make a quick entrance - from the moment Sam’s waters broke to the moment she gave birth was around just 5 hours!
As the babies were born prematurely at 35+3 weeks gestation, they are staying in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at SCUH.
“All the staff members that we have been involved with have been so lovely and caring to every need,” Tyrone said.
“The staff in the NICU go above and beyond.”
Tyrone said the twins are doing really well.
“They were off CPAP in around 48 hours which is amazing for premature babies,” he said.
Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) is when air (and sometimes oxygen) is gently blown into the lungs to help a baby breathe easier. It can be given through small tubes placed just inside the nose, or with a tiny mask on the face.
The next step for the family is to get Eleanor and Xavier to a healthy weight and enjoy some bonding time.
“We can’t wait to go home and start enjoying our family of five,” Tyrone said.
Congratulations to Sam, Tyrone and Elijah on the arrival of Eleanor and Xavier!