One mother gave birth to three boys and two girls at the University Hospital in Kraków on Feb. 12, an event that ended up warranting a press conference.
All five children are in stable condition, given their premature birth, and will join their older siblings in three months.
The children weigh from 710 to 1,400 grams and are around 40 centimeters tall. Their mother, Dominika Clarke, is Polish and the father is British. The quintuplets were given English names: Charles Patrick, Henry James, Elizabeth May, Evangeline Rose, and Arianna Daisy.
“I feel better than I had expected,” said Dominika during the press conference. “It is something that not everyone can experience, such a pregnancy happens once in 52 million times,” added the mother, joking that she and her husband had a better chance to win the lottery.
Due to fears of complications since she was carrying quintuplets, the mother was in the hospital for the last 10 weeks. All five children were born through cesarean section in the 28th week of the pregnancy. The delivery was successful thanks to a team of doctors guided by prof. Hubert Huras.
The couple already had seven children between 10 months and 12 years old, including two pairs of twins. They met in England where Dominika taught English and later also mathematics. They came to Poland six years ago and built a house with a garden; they both run their own business.
“It was a high-risk pregnancy,” said Huras. He added that due to multiple complications, including hypertension, the mother of quintuples was laid up while the entire team — doctors, nurses and midwives — “practically stood on their heads” in order to safeguard the pregnancy for the children and their mother.
The parents admitted that they only told their children about three babies, as they “did not want to scare them.”
“If you have a positive attitude, then it is possible to have a nice life with such a large bunch of children,” the father said. He added that he was happy about the blessing of having so many children, following the initial shock, as he had not expected to have quintuplets.
“We will do everything we can to protect all the children,” he assured.
