Triplets are conceived two weeks apart thanks to rare and natural phenomenon

A Kent couple have relived the astonishing moment they became the world’s first parents to conceive triplets – two weeks apart.

Jolene Broad and her farmer husband Toby were stunned when medics told them Mrs Broad had fallen pregnant twice in one month due to an incredibly rare phenomenon.

At a routine scan, the shocked couple learned she had conceived with one embryo that had split into two, and then fallen pregnant again over a week later with another baby, something called superfoetation.

There are only 25 documented cases worldwide – and none involving triplets.

Jolene, 37, said: “They told me there was a couple of weeks difference between the
babies.

“It meant I had fallen pregnant first time – with one embryo that had then split into two causing identical twins.

“And then a couple of weeks later I’d ovulated a second time in the same cycle and had fallen pregnant again with a third baby.

“It was unbelievable."

The Canterbury couple had only just started trying for a baby when equine dentist Jolene discovered she was pregnant.

She said: “I was 35 and I thought it would have taken a while, if at all, for me to fall pregnant, so I was stunned to find out I was pregnant after only a few weeks.

“When I went for my scan, I was half expecting to be told I was pregnant with twins because my stomach had grown a lot and I was exceptionally tired.

“I thought I was too big for there just to be one baby in there.”

But when Jolene, now a full-time mum, lay on the hospital bed and the sonographer ran her scanner over her stomach, she received some startling news.

“They asked if I’d had IVF and I was puzzled and said no, that I hadn’t,” she recalled.

“I looked at the monitor and I could see the outline of my womb and it looks crammed with blobs.

“Then the sonographer told us we were having triplets. I couldn’t believe it.”

But there was more surprising news to come. The babies had been conceived separately, too.

Mrs Broad said: “They could tell by measuring the backs of their necks that they had been conceived at different times.

“They told me the twins had been conceived first with one embryo that had split into two, and then I had fallen pregnant again two weeks later with another baby.

Jolene was 32 weeks pregnant when doctors delivered twins Kathleen and Delilah, weighing just over 3lb each, and their smaller sister Tabitha, at 2lb 15oz.

She said: “They were in hospital for four weeks before I was allowed to bring them home.

“They are 18 months old now and they are doing fine. Tabitha was tiny, but she has proved to be such a tough little cookie – she’s the only one walking out of the three of them.

“When they are old enough I will explain to them how remarkable their birth was.”