An Illinois woman is in shock after she went to the hospital for a sore throat and found out she was pregnant with quadruplets.
It was an ordinary day for Katelyn Yates. The 20-year-old nursing student woke up that morning with a sore throat and decided to get it checked out at the hospital.
The doctors took a look and told the Illinois woman that she would need to get an X-ray to see what might be wrong. But, before she was allowed to have one, she had to take a pregnancy test, since the radiation from machine could harm a fetus.
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She took the test, which she expected to come back negative, and was shocked to discover that her levels of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), the hormone produced by the placenta during pregnancy, was “off the charts,” she told PEOPLE her doctor told her.
Given that she had gone in on April 1, which was April Fools’ Day, she figured the doctors might be pranking her, but they were deadly serious. “I was in complete shock,” she told the outlet.
Her now-fiancé Julien Bueker, 21, was ecstatic, however. The pair had only been dating for about six months by the time she found out she was pregnant, and he was “so excited” and did everything he could to keep her calm throughout her hospital visit.
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Yates opted to go through with the pregnancy, it was reported, but it was a complex process. By week 20, she was diagnosed with preeclampsia, which is a condition that causes persistent high blood pressure. “I couldn’t breathe on my own,” the mother told the magazine.
Her liver and kidneys soon began to fail, too, it was reported. She ultimately gave birth on Oct. 17, or just 28 weeks and 4 days, to quadruplets. She named them Elizabeth Taylor, Zya Grace, Max Ashton and Elliot Ryker, the latter two being identical twins.
All were born at HSHS St. John’s Hospital in Springfield by C-section. Yates said they were extremely underweight, with Elizabeth being the smallest at just 1 pound, 2 ounces. Max was the largest of them, weighing 2 pounds and 6 ounces.
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Nearly a month later, she said the babies are “doing phenomenal” and that they’re “gaining weight and growing,” she told Today. “Elizabeth is about six grams away from reaching 2 pounds,” she said.
“It’s amazing to see how well they’re doing,” she added. “Just a few weeks ago, they were the size of my hand.” It wasn’t clear what the timeline was on the babies’ hospital stay, but images show the new parents holding the children, with one of the babies just barely extending beyond Bueker’s gently clasped hand around it.
