The birth of sextuplets ended the frustration of infertility. It all happened so quickly.
Keith Dilley, 29, was a manager at a Burger King in Bloomington. Becki Dilley, 27, was a nurse in the oncology department of Bloomington Hospital. Together, they were a couple who wanted to have children but couldn’t. They had tried for nearly six years and gone through heartache and hard times in their marriage because they couldn’t have a baby.
They decided to undergo fertility treatment, and finally, after years of waiting, she became pregnant. Her first few pregnancy scans gave her the shock of her life: she discovered she was pregnant with six babies. More of them than they’d ever planned on, more perhaps than they were really ready for. Despite finally getting what she wanted, Becki was warned to brace for a dangerous and high-risk pregnancy. At one point in her pregnancy, she was so big that she could not fit into the shower.
On May 25, 1993, at Women’s Hospital (formerly Humana), a team of 30 doctors and nurses began to do a C-section on Becki to deliver the babies. The Dilleys became the parents of the first set of sextuplets born in Indiana. They delivered four boys and two girls, namely Brenna, Julian, Quinn, Claire, Ian and Adrian. Six of them in four minutes. Although they had only been in their mom’s womb for seven months at the time of their birth, they were all born healthy.
At last, they were parents, and they were happy about it. But they also seemed a little dazed. “Sometimes it’s kind of overwhelming,” Keith Dilley says. “There’s a lot we haven’t thought about – a lot we haven’t had time to think about. It’s hard to keep up.”
They raised their children without nannies or daycare, which was quite challenging. Becki eventually returned to work as a nurse while Keith stayed home with the kids. As their kids got older, it got easier for them. Becki chimed in to say that the six siblings had already slowly started to develop their own personalities. Adrian, the youngest, was said to be the naughtiest. Claire was the leader of the siblings, while Julian was the more impulsive one. Ian is artistic and passionate about dance, Quinn is a kind gentleman, and Brenna is kind, affectionate, and gentle.
Years later, the sextuplets’ personalities evolved even more from when they were children. Now 30 years old, they remain the only bunch of sextuplets to survive. They all decided to pursue different paths, with one of them, Julian, choosing to become a doctor. Two more of his siblings also chose to be in the medical field. Julian’s brother Ian is a pharmacist, while his sister Claire is an emergency room nurse. Their sister Brenna chose to pursue a career in law, while Adrian and Quinn chose military careers. As there’s a one in 4.7 billion chance of falling pregnant with sextuplets, the Dilleys are a modern-day miracle.
In another amazing multiple-birth story, a single mother who once gave birth to octuplets recently celebrated her children’s 14th birthday. Click here to read all about it.
