Written by: Toby Amir Fox

It was August 14, 2008. The only thing worse than being pregnant in Arizona in the summer is being pregnant with twins during the Arizona summer. So by the time I reached 36 weeks in mid-August I was miserable. Don’t get me wrong, I was thrilled to have made that far without any complications, but I was huge, hot and exhausted.  At 36 weeks 5 days the decision was made to induce my labor. The babies and I were both healthy, but for two weeks my blood pressure had been on the high end of normal. I was also very swollen and my doctor felt that the risk me of staying pregnant developing complications outweighed the benefits to the babies. So off to the hospital we went.

The induction started at 10:30 am and I labored without any major complications for the rest of the day and into the night. Around 11:15 pm two things started to happen: my epidural began to wear off and I started to feel my contractions more intensely. I paged the nurse, who determined it was time to push. Now this is when things started getting really interesting. I was determined to deliver vaginally and agreed to deliver in the operating room in case there were complications. The next 15 minutes were a blur as the staff prepared to transfer me. I remember very little of what happened during this time, with one exception. I clearly remember my doctor coming over to my beside for a quick chat with my husband and me. At which point he calmly explained that it was getting close to midnight and there was a real possibility that our twins would be born on two different days, with two different birthdays. Were we ok with this and did we have a preference one way or the other?

In retrospect, it is pretty amazing that my doctor had the wherewithal to even ask such a question. I do not remember if my husband had an opinion on the matter. But I sure did. And I recall telling my doctor, quite adamantly, that my twins were going to be born on the same day and share a birthday. Because I was not going to spend the next 18+ years explaining to people that yes, we have twins, but they have two different birthdays. I am sure there are some people who would think this is cool, but I am not one of them.
Around 11:30 p.m. I was wheeled into the OR. The trip itself was exciting. The process of being moved from the bed to the operating table was humiliating. What little modesty I had left was gone, I can’t move anything from the waist down, and it took a small army of people to move me. Fun times.

With my older son, I pushed for two hours and I was determined not do that again. So when the doctor told me to push this time I pushed like there was no tomorrow. Minutes later, my precious Baby A arrived at 11:54 p.m.

After we knew that Baby A was out and breathing okay, a nurse looked at my husband said, “If you want these babies to have the same birthday your wife has two minutes to push Baby B out.” I took a deep breath and literally pushed as hard and as fast as I could. And then I took another breath and kept pushing. Just as her sister had done minutes earlier, I felt something slip underneath my pelvis and out my body. My precious Baby B. Born at 11:59 pm.

Two girls. One birthday.