Jenny Marr would have been pardoned to believe that something could have been wrong with her unborn baby when her doctor casted her a strange look as she conducted the first ultrasound…
She had no idea that Dr. Lauren Murray was going to turn her life and that of her partner around.
All the people who had been expecting a baby and have visited the sonographer understand how stressful and thrilling it is.
It is actually touching to watch something on that black screen and realize it is a living organism. In the case of Jenny Marr and her partner Chris however, it was those things and much more.
The couple are of Grapevine, Texas and met in a local pub where they had been trying to have a baby over a period of months. However, when Jenny finally conceived, she and Chris got a shock of their life during a routine ultrasound.
It was then that Jenny knew that she was not pregnant with one baby.
Jenny told TODAY of the moment: “It was: oh no, I couldn’t find a heartbeat.’ And she goes, No there is a heartbeat. She says, ‘Well there are three babes in there, yall.’ And we just were stunned.”
This naturally brought Jenny and her partner Chris into shock but this is not where the surprises had ended.
A week after that, during another visit to a maternal-fetal medicine specialist (November 19, 2019), they received the same strange stare when the technician making the ultrasound scanned them.
The tech (on initial (scan)) had a funny look on her face. We would be saying, oh, what is happening this time? Chris told TODAY, We became concerned once more.
She was very adorable. She told me that, ‘I am not supposed to tell you this, but you have four babies.’”
It had been 7 days of waiting to find out that they are having one child, to finding out that they were having FOUR.
Chris commented: I joked that I will not be returning because next time there will be five babies. We were mere shocked. It was easier to swallow three to four. And soon afterwards we heard they were healthy.”
According to calculations of Dr. Lauren Murray and her colleagues, the chance of multiple birth of exactly identical, spontaneously born quadruplets is 1 in 11 million or 1 in 15 million of all births … beyond rare to say the very least.
“It’s unbelievable. I will never have it go that way again in my career. I said, girl run out and get some lottery tickets that is what we are talking about as far as odds, said Murray. How wonderful it was.
Although there was a risk that one of the newborns would suck nutrients out of the other ones, leading to the necessity of the surgery and complications, it later occurred that this four was absolutely prepared to share.
The infants were very generous. On the sonogram they did not see any events or leading to it where we were even concerned that one of them or two or three of them were going to turn out to be drastically smaller than the others, Murray said.
Thus on March 15 at 28.5 weeks, Jenny went into labor.
She was struggling to go to week 33 but instead had to deliver prematurely. Her C-sections were performed in good condition, and the babies were born at the onset of the coronavirus madness.
The first was Baby Harrison who weighed 2 pounds and 6 ounces. Then there was Hardy who weighed 2 pounds 10 ounces, then Henry weighing 2 pounds 6.7 ounces, and last but not the least was Hudson weighing 1 pound 15 ounces.
All were born in three minutes. It is amazing, Jenny said. We named them our baby birds since they actually looked like baby birds.
Three among four remained under the neonatal intensive care unit during 10 weeks as they needed oxygen, among others. but come around home, in early May … and Jenny and Chris are as happy as possible.
A year later, Jenny addressed DFW Child and informed her about the progress of her quadruplets.
They are all crawling. two of which will be walking in a month or so, which is to say the rest are not much behind. They are into everything. They are filthy and untidy. They are already such small boys! Mealtime is simply a matter of putting the food in their grill as quickly as they can manage. They are comical and simply adorable.”
And we only hope this little story and our boys will be to everyone half as good as they are to us, Jenny said.
The children are today already 3 years old and the quadruplets appeared to be doing well.
Jenny has made a blog in Instagram where everyone can track the path of the family. She has 140,000 followers, and the woman played the role of dental assistant in the past, so she tends to update and give a glimpse of the daily life of the Marr family, which is quite busy.
Being so unique in the way she was born, it is expected that a lot of people want to know more and to see the curiosity regarding the type of family Jenny grew up in and how she was born. Jenny claims that she was pregnant without medical and pharmaceutical help to these boys.
Jenny is also inundated with questions by many on how she is managing with four energetic boys.
I know nothing other than this and I have no other alternative! When I was growing up, my family had preschools and the age of the entry was 8 weeks. I used to sit with the babies in preschool. Jenny was often surrounded by children and it became like second nature to her to care about children.
Quelque chose cest quoi. You have to be able to take a punch. I recall myself telling my doctor, “Should I take parenting classes?” No, you will learn things in the NICU. And that is four. No one will teach you to do this.
Another question that people pose seems to be about how Jenny and Chris could distinguish the boys.
Well as their parents we just sort of know. We are used to see 4 faces, however, different personalities and different voices. To the person just meeting them: (in birth order), Harrison is the tallest and with the most hair. Hardy is super thin and the front tooth is chipped. Henry is chubby faced and his hair jumps with his running. Hudson is the smallest and with a freckle on his forehead. Thats nearly all I can say to you as to how to distinguish them,” responds Jenny.
There are four beautiful little bairns born … O what a blessed day it was in March 15.
Jenny and Chris, I am so glad to hear this. I cannot even imagine what the memories you will have as a family will be like, what a love you will feel in your house.