A California woman is speaking out about the shocking moment she learned that she was pregnant with her own biological child while carrying another baby as a surrogate.
Jessica Allen talked to ABC News about the extremely rare medical incident. She says the doctors told her that they initially believed the second child was an identical twin.
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In this scenario, a woman continues to ovulate after becoming pregnant. When this happens, fertilization and implementation of a second embryo can result in two babies with different gestational ages and two sets of genetic parents, which is what happened in this case.
Allen said that she gave birth to two healthy children of her own and that she wanted to help other women who might be struggled to have children.
“No woman in the world should have to live their life without experiencing the love and the bond from a mother and a child,” Allen said.
In April of 2016, Allen was matched with a Chinese couple and one of their embryos were successfully implanted into her uterus.
Six weeks into her pregnancy, the doctors noticed during an ultrasound that there were two babies.
“He started moving the ultrasound around and he goes, ‘Well I definitely see that there is another baby,’ ” Allen said. “The chance of an embryo splitting is very small, but it does happen, and I just thought … I was very surprised.”
Allen went on to deliver what she believed to be identical twin boys via Cesarean section. She never saw the babies in person but was later shown a photo of the two.
“I did notice that one was much lighter than the other,” Allen said. “You know, obviously they were not identical twins.”
It wasn’t until months later that Allen received the news that the second baby was not a twin to the implanted embryo. The second child was actually her and her husband’s biological son.
Allen and her husband did a DNA test to confirm that the second baby was their child.
“I don’t know how to describe it … we were floored,” Allen said. “We were like, how did this happen?”
After a complicated legal process, Allen and her husband got custody of their son in February. Their third child, who is now 10 months old, is now part of the family and is “learning fast.”
“He’s just so smart, so intelligent,” Allen said of her youngest son. “He’s learning fast. He’s got two big brothers to run after and learn from.”
