The Miracle of IVF: While Expecting Twins, Their Lives Changed with the Surprise of a Third Baby
Shelby Stewart and her husband were very excited when they learned they were expecting a baby. The couple wanted to give their daughter Bennett a sibling, but they knew the process would not be easy. Shelby had battled cancer in her youth and was told she would not be able to have her own child. However, they were reunited with Bennett through in vitro fertilization. When they wanted to have a second child, they resorted to the same method again. After a long and difficult treatment process, they were very happy to learn that Shelby was pregnant. However, during the check-up to confirm the pregnancy, the doctors made a surprising discovery: In addition to the two embryos transferred, there was another baby in the uterus. The tests showed that this baby did not come from a splitting egg, but from a completely separate embryo. When the twins were born, it turned out that Shelby was actually expecting triplets.
“We were shocked by this news,” says Shelby, who lives in Utah with her husband Chase. “I had been pregnant naturally before, but I did not know this. Two embryos were implanted through in vitro fertilization and both of them took hold. We couldn’t believe it when we found out we were pregnant with triplets. Now the triplets have an incredible bond. Bennett is a wonderful big sister; she was expecting a sibling, she never knew she would have triplets!”
When Shelby was 15, she battled a type of blood cancer called non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and doctors told her she would go into early menopause. Years later, when she met her husband Chase, she explained it to him and they decided to try IVF. They got pregnant with Bennett on the second try and had a healthy birth. The doctors told them that time was running out and they had to act fast to have another child. “We started right away, but we tried five times and none of them worked,” Shelby says. “It was emotionally draining, but we knew we had to stick with it.”
The fertility specialists recommended a different medication and after an egg retrieval, two embryos were obtained. They decided to transfer both. “The chances of us having just one child were very low,” Shelby says. “When the pregnancy test came back positive, we didn’t really get our hopes up, but the blood tests came back with some strange results. I was worried I was miscarrying, but the scan showed three little sacs. We couldn’t believe it!”
At first, doctors thought one of the embryos had split, but when the triplets were born — two girls, Etta and Margot, and a son, Garner, at 35 weeks — tests showed they came from completely separate embryos. “The only explanation was that I had been pregnant naturally before and didn’t know it,” Shelby says. “So when the two embryos were transferred, I was actually pregnant with three babies! The doctors at the clinic said they had never seen this before.”
Five days after giving birth, Shelby was diagnosed with peripartum cardiomyopathy, a condition where the heart is enlarged due to pregnancy. Recovery was slow, but she’s now stable. The triplets, who are now three years old, keep the family on the move. “They’re like a little gang,” Shelby laughs. “And Bennett is a great big sister and helps us a lot. I hope our story shows everyone who struggles with infertility that miracles are possible.”
