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HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) — Sextuplets born this week in Alabama are doing well, doctors said.
Their parents, Eric and Courtney Waldrop of Albertville, joined doctors Thursday to talk to reporters about the babies, the first sextuplets born in the state since 2011.
Dr. Lee Morris said the three boys and three girls were born about 10 weeks early. Doctors said Monday's delivery went smoothly, and all six babies were stable and cried at delivery.
The babies will remain at Huntsville Hospital's high-risk nursery for at least six more weeks. Courtney Waldrop said she has already talked to other parents of multiple babies for advice and support.
Doctors said the delivery went well because of teamwork at the hospital. "A lot of people don't realize what it takes to prepare for an event like this. It was a phenomenal undertaking, and it paid off," said Dr. Antonio Gonzalez-Ruiz, a maternal-fetal medicine specialist.
The Waldrops discussed their reaction when they first learned that Courtney would be having as many as six children.
"It was probably the toughest day of our lives," he said. "We went to God and had a hard conversation." They were worried, he said, about "the difficulties we could be presented."
Courtney tried to carry the six infants for as long as possible.
She said one of her worries during the pregnancy was that she couldn't be the kind of parent she had been to the couple's other three children.
Courtney said it was important to give the babies unique names. The three boys are Blu, Layke and Tag; the three girls, Rawlings, Rayne and Rivers,
The sextuplets will join their three other sons, 8-year-old Sailor, and 5-year-old twin boys Bridge and Wales.
"I think when we bring them home, and all six cries start in the middle of the night, that's when they'll really understand what this is about," Eric Waldrop said.
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