"Honestly, I also had extremely bad postpartum, and I didn't know how to deal with it that well.”
In 1989, a woman named Lily gave birth to a set of quintuplets — but only four of them survived.
On June 3, one of those quadruplets, Theresa Troia, became a single mom for the first time. As fate would have it, she also gave birth to quintuplets — all five of whom survived their premature birth.
“My mom made this happen,” Troia, a 36-year-old nursing consultant in El Paso, said in an interview with Today, published Aug. 21.
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The 36-year-old’s three daughters Kyla, Viviana and Isabella, and two sons Joseph and Jaxon, were conceived without the aid of fertility drugs and were born at 28 weeks gestation, per the outlet.
Troia likened their arrival via C-section as a scene “straight out of Grey’s Anatomy.”
“Everything was so well-orchestrated and rehearsed,” she told Today. “It all went smoothly. I worried I wouldn’t be able to turn off my nurse brain and just be a patient, but I was actually able to enjoy it.”
The smallest of the quintuplets weighed 1 pound, 3 pounces at birth. The largest was 2 pounds, 8 ounces.
In a Facebook reel posted on July 5, Troia shared that all five babies are healthy.
“Five perfect babies. Five strong heartbeats. Five tiny souls who’ve already changed mine. My heart is full, and now I understand what purpose truly feels like,” she wrote in the reel.
According to Today, three of the quintuplets — Kyla, Jaxon and Isabella — have already made it home from the hospital. The other two are set to join their siblings soon.
Troia details the fear of welcoming quintuplets as a single mom
Troia first announced her pregnancy with the world in a May 7 Facebook post, which was also her 36th birthday.
In the post, she described it as a “full-circle moment” and also revealed that her quintuplets are “rainbow babies.”
“Thank you to my first baby, for being the beginning of this miracle,” she wrote. "Your short life changed everything and transformed my life in ways I can’t truly express.”
“I carry all of you — in my body, in my heart and in my soul, forever intertwined,” she added.
From the moment Troia found out she was pregnant, the single mom admitted that she was ridden with fear.
“I remember calling my best friend and saying, ‘Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God,’” she told Today.
“I was afraid to say the words out loud because it would mean I had to accept it, and part of me thought, ‘No way can I do this on my own,’” she continued.
But as she revealed in her Facebook reel, she wasn’t alone at all.
“The moment I stepped into the OR, that fear slowly melted away,” she wrote — describing the delivery as the “smoothest, most incredible C-section anyone could hope for.”
“It wasn’t just a delivery… it was a masterpiece of love, skill, and teamwork,” she continued. “People say it takes a village, and mine showed up — unplanned, unexpected, but absolutely present.”
Despite the initial fear, Troia said she had the “most extraordinary angel in heaven” watching over her: her mom.
“When I look at my five little miracles… every tear, every ear, every moment — it was all worth it,” she wrote.
And not only do her quintuplets have her by their side, but they also have each other.
While talking to Today, Troia revealed that her 11-week-old babies are already reaching for each other and stop crying anytime they touch one another.
She went on to praise her parents for showing her what it takes to raise a loving family.
“It’s so strange to have grown up as a quadruplet and now be on the other side as a mom,” she told Today. “It feels pretty surreal.”
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According to Raising Multiples, quintuplets occur in roughly one in 50 million births in the United States — while quadruplets occur in about one in 570,0000 pregnancies.
