Awesome Foursome

She thought she was carrying a big baby-then Jabulile gave birth to four little bundles of joy!

SHE kept her pregnancy a secret for months – she already had a child out of wedlock and was afraid she’d disgrace her family if she told them about the baby she was carrying.

Even so, Jabulile Sangweni (30) from Dumbe near Vryheid in KwaZulu-Natal, hoped for twins. But she never expected to give birth to four babies.

Jabulile’s quadruplets, who were born after she went into labour at six months, have been described as miracle babies. They’re tiny but healthy and the young mom is still marvelling at the fact she had no idea she was carrying four babies.

“I could feel something kicking but I never thought there were eight legs inside me,” Jabulile tells us from Lower Umfolozi War Memorial Regional Hospital in Empangeni where she’s staying until her babies are strong enough to go home.

When they were born little Halala Bayanda, Halalisile Bandile, Nqubeko Mandisa and Nqobile Luyanda weighed between 1,01kg and 1,29kg – that’s little over two bricks of butter each.

As is often the case with babies who are born prematurely, the quads’ lungs haven’t developed properly, explains Dr Menitha Samjowan, who’s taking care of the babies.

“In most cases they are underdeveloped and their bodies can only handle small feeds,” she explains.

The babies – one boy and three girls – are breathing with respiratory support. “Once all four babies can breathe on their own they’ll be transferred out of our premature high care unit to our kangaroo mother care unit [where babies are strapped to their mom’s chest to feel her heartbeat and mimic the conditions of the womb].

“They’ll be discharged once they’ve reached a weight of 1,8kg and are deemed ready to leave,” Samjowan adds.