You can’t have a sibling 11 weeks older than you.
Or can you?
Well, an incredible woman from Kazakhstan made headlines after giving birth to her second twin 11 weeks after the birth of her first baby.
Liliya Konovalova, a resident of Uralsk in Kazakhstan, gave birth to her daughter prematurely on May 24, 2019, while her son was born after a full-term on August 9, 2019.
According to the Health Ministry of Kazakhstan, the chances of such an event are very thin – and by thin, we mean 50 million to one. But Liliya defied all the odds and became the first case of her type in the history of the country.
Liya, Liliya’s daughter, was born 25 weeks into her mom’s pregnancy, weighing just 1lb 13oz.
The tiny baby had to remain in neonatal intensive care for more than a month. Liya’s twin brother was born more than 2 months later and had a healthy weight of 6lb 6oz.
The highly improbable case is only possible in one condition and that is the mother having a dual uterus. This extremely rare condition is caused by an abnormality while the person is still in their mother’s womb and is known as uterus didelphys.
Liliya, who suffers from uterus didelphys, has two uteruses and her twin babies grew up in two wombs instead of one.
The mother, who is extremely happy with the care provided to her and her babies by the hospital staff, is now about to take her babies home.
Both Liya and Maxine weigh just under 10lbs now but they’ll be living a healthy life.
“I was shocked when I found out that I had such a condition,” Liliya said. “I was so worried about the life of my premature baby. But our doctors were great.
“What they did was a miracle. They showed themselves to be real professionals.”
The odds of having such births are extremely rare, and such a long gap between the two births is an even rarer condition. After carefully examining Liliya’s condition following her first birth, the doctors patiently waited for the second baby to come to the world.
“We learned about this condition almost immediately, during the first birth, so our specialists took direct care of the second birth,” said Eset Yeralin, the deputy director of the regional perinatal center.
“All this time the mother was in our center, caring for the girl and waiting for the second birth.”