The First All-Girl Sextuplets On The Globe Are Adults Today

Feb 24, 2021

The internet is filled with heartwarming stories of multiple births, such as twins and triplets, but it is still quite rare to hear about more than three babies born at once. With the rise of fertility treatments today, however, we are seeing more instances of quintuplets and sextuplets — and sometimes even more! Back in the day, cases like this were far and few in between, and definitely led to some fame. One such case was the successful birth of the world's very first all-girl sextuplets. 

Born in 1983 in Liverpool, England, these six girls made headlines as the fourth ever surviving pair of sextuplets in the world and the first set of all girls. It used to be the case that premature babies would not always survive in multiple births, but the fact that all six girls survived their infancy was quite a cause for celebration in 1983. Today, the girls are women with their own lives and continue to have strong bonds with their families.

Their parents, Janet and Graham Walton, had been trying for years to start a family. Twelve failed rounds of infertility treatments finally led to success when the pair learned they were pregnant during their 13th attempt. They were in for the surprise of their lives when they learned that Janet was actually carrying six babies. Because of the precarious nature of carrying six babies at once, Janet had to be admitted to the hospital. Thankfully, the pregnancy progressed beautifully and Janet gave birth to six beautiful and healthy baby girls on Nov. 18, 1983, at only 31 weeks of gestation.

They remain special because they remain the only set of all-girl sextuplets that have survived through infancy to date. It was not easy during the first few years as the couple kept busy raising Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah. The Waltons went through over 10,000 diapers and survived on very little sleep. But eventually, the babies turned into toddlers and then little girls. Thinking back to the moment they came to know it was sextuplets, Janet told the Guardian that she noticed the sonographer's expression change during a scan, and when she asked if there was a problem.

"(The sonographer) said, 'well, it looks as though you might be carrying more than one.' So I thought, hurrah! It’s twins."

After a while, though, the mood shifted in the room and more doctors came in. The whispering and the lack of information got to Janet, who then asked the doctor to tell her what was happening. "That’s when the doctor dropped a bombshell," Janet explained. "He said, 'It’s definitely a multiple pregnancy. You’re having six babies.'" Though this is a shocking thing to hear, Janet reportedly still got excited telling the story 30 years later in 2015. The odds of something like this happening were 104 billion to one, which is no small thing! Due to the nature of the pregnancy, Janet had to be admitted to the hospital immediately and stay there until her babies came. She did not continue with her job at the bank and remained at the hospital for the rest of her pregnancy.

About that decision, she said, "I knew, somewhere very deep inside myself, that these babies were going to be fine. I simply didn’t consider an alternative. I decided I was going to be the best patient the hospital had ever had and do whatever it took to keep these babies safe." And this was how it turned out to be! This was still a daunting thing for medical professionals at the time, though, and there was no guarantee about how things would turn out. Initially, the doctors decided that 23 weeks of gestation would be enough as the babies would stand a chance of survival then. However, Janet was able to make it to 31 weeks of gestation, at which point the doctors decided it was best to operate. 

"The hospital staff were all really excited but I’m sure there were plenty of people around me who didn’t think I had much chance of taking six babies home," she told The Guardian. On the day of her babies' birth, there was a lot of planning involved. "So many people were involved. There was a team for me and a team for each baby. All leave was canceled – they even shut down a ward," she said. After she came out of general anesthesia, the first question she asked her doctors was if her babies were all alive. All the girls weighed between 2 pounds and 1 ounce and 3 pounds 8 ounces. And yes, all of them made it! However, the first 48 hours were still critical, and all the babies were numbered to keep track of the six newborns.

Baby number one was Hannah, who works as a school teacher, according to The Guardian. Baby number two, Luci, is an airline stewardess, while baby number three, Ruth, works as a receptionist. Baby number five is Kate, who works in HR, and baby number six was Jennie, who runs a sweet shop in Leeds. Baby number four, Sarah, was the first of the sextuplets to have a baby, and her daughter, Jorgie, is the apple of everyone's eyes. Speaking about her family, Luci said, "I suppose it’s a bit like having a party the whole time." Ruth added, "We all get on really well. And we’re all loving being aunties to Jorgie." 

There is certainly a stark contrast between having six children at once and one child at a time. For the sextuplets, having six children of their own is daunting enough and neither plans to have so many. Their mother, Janet, reminisces about the old days with six children at home, however. "Jorgie was born on a Tuesday, and by Friday she was home. In contrast, it was six weeks before our girls came home — they’d been in the special care baby unit — and we brought them back two at a time," Janet told the Daily Mail.

"From the start, it was absolutely full-on. Daunting .... Looking back, I don’t know how we managed; honestly I don’t ... We lived through those early years in a blur. We had no time to think. We were just doing. And the only regret is that there wasn’t enough time to enjoy them as much as we’d have liked," she adds.

The girls' dad, Graham, also chimes in with his own experiences of those times. He left his job as a painter and decorator for a year when his daughters were born so that he could help care for them. "We used to get through cases of talcum powder," he told the Daily Mail. "It was as foggy as Victorian London in our house when they were babies. But they don’t use talc now, do they?"

He was also clear that having six children was not a reason for house arrest for the family. "Just because we had six babies at once, it didn’t mean we were imprisoned in the house," he recalled. "We got out. Jan and I both took a double buggy and a baby each in a papoose. If anyone was visiting, they’d push the third double buggy."

Even with the formidable task of raising six children at once and doing so successfully, he says that he would still do everything all over again if given the chance. "I loved those early years so much. I couldn’t say one phase was better than the others. But there was always so much to do, we didn’t enjoy it as much as we would if we’d had one at a time. With grandchildren, you have time," he adds. 

We are sure that the proud grandparents are loving this phase of their life as much as they loved being parents. All of their daughters, apart from Jennie, live close to their house, so the family continues to remain close even today.

Did you hear about the Waltons back in 1983? Are you amazed to see the six girls all grown up? Tell us your thoughts, and be sure to spread the joy of this heartwarming video to everyone you know.