We all know that fertility varies from woman to woman: Some struggle to get pregnant, while others are surprised by a pregnancy when they’re trying to avoid it. But getting pregnant while you’re already pregnant? That seems to go beyond the extremes of human fertility. I know it sounds quite unusual and for some, it would be brand new information. But you know human anatomy always surprises us. Although exceptions and miracles certainly happen. At least for a handful of women – it has happened. There isn’t much data on the pregnancies and deliveries of these cases, given that superfetation is so unusual.
Know something more about SUPERFETATION:
This is like a “MIRACLE”
Something unusual about pregnancy!
For some people, discovering that they’re expecting one baby is enough of a shock. There are a bunch of explanations for not wanting to be pregnant such as morning sickness, leg cramps, and heartburn, just to name a few. Nevertheless, the liberation to have sex with your partner whenever you want without worrying about birth control is one of pregnancy’s bigger selling points. Just to give a thought if you find out you’re pregnant with a second child while you’re already pregnant with one? While that scenario sounds like something straight coming out of a movie and it’s a real thing.
After all, you can’t get pregnant when you’re pregnant, RIGHT?! Well, there are exceptions in this world and maybe everything you know about pregnancy is not always enough. It doesn’t matter how much you are informed or experienced everything you thought about pregnancy and fertility is pretty much wrong. There are possibilities that you can add another bun to your oven even when one’s already cooking in there.
Superfetation
The anatomy of the human body never fails to surprise with research and studies often revealing newer things about it. A dual pregnancy like this is medically referred to as superfetation that can only occur under a couple of special circumstances. However, you should know clearly that superfetation is extremely rare. The research proposes that superfetation may only happen in one out of a few million pregnancies, and it’s thought that there are fewer than 10 cases reported in the medical literature.
How does it happen?
In general cases, ovulation in women gets restricted right after they conceive, which reopens after the prevailing pregnancy cycle gets a closure. Also, certain hormonal changes do not allow another embryo to develop. But in some rare cases, ovulation remains open for a few days even after women conceive. If during this period (within 10 days), such women have sexual intercourse, then there is a possibility of the occurrence of another fetus and its development.
It is more like additional ovulation. Also, in general cases, the thin layer of the endometrial line doesn’t let another fetus enter the already developing embryo, but in rare cases, it successfully penetrates through it and starts developing. Hence children born out of such conditions are twins but not identical. In superfetation, the timing of second intercourse differs. It occurs with same-day ovulation with two different fathers or the second ovulation can occur even weeks apart.
True Stories
1. A California woman became pregnant while she was already pregnant, in an extremely rare case that resulted in her carrying “twins” with two different sets of parents.
2.The 31-year-old woman, Jessica Allen, agreed to be a gestational surrogate for a Chinese couple that she met through a surrogacy agency in southern California. Allen soon became pregnant with the other couple’s baby, but at six weeks of pregnancy, she was told she was carrying twins. She believed the Chinese couple’s embryo had split in two, making the twins identical. A month after she had given birth to the two babies, she learned that the “twins” were not. They looked different, and a DNA test confirmed that one baby was Allen’s biological child and the other baby was the Chinese couple’s child.
3.An Australian woman had “twin” girls who were 10 days apart in age because she was pregnant with two babies at the same time.
4. Recent case , where a woman conceived twins 3 weeks apart and it was all over the news .
Risk
Although this is a rarest of rare condition which involves hardly any risk for the mother. But it does involve the risk of having a premature baby too because while one baby may be ready to be born, the other one might be at the developing stage in the womb. But there shouldn’t be a problem with safety and the babies should be fine and make it almost to full term, especially if you have good prenatal health and obstetrical care.
The two babies most likely will have to be born on the same day, regardless of when they were conceived or how long of a period they’ve had to develop. It may be necessary to induce labor early or deliver both babies by C-section since it’d be nearly impossible to deliver one at a time, but those instances are also common in regular multiple births.
Image source @rebecca robertson
