Naturally conceived, fraternal triplets occur once in every 25,000 births. That is why when Christie Fletcher found out she was pregnant with non-identical triplets she was totally shocked. However, she was also shocked because when she conceived she was “religiously” taking the pill.
Now she is the mother of triplets plus her first born son, Osian. When Fletcher became pregnant with Osian, she was on the pill but wasn’t taking it faithfully; after he was born, she committed to taking the pill correctly.
Fletcher said: “I was so shocked to find that I was pregnant again. I had been taking my pill carefully and never in a million years did I expect to end up with triplets. I was on the pill when I fell pregnant with Osian, but I hadn’t really been that careful in making sure I took it at the same time.
After I had him, I was so strict about taking my pill every day as according to instructions – I took it religiously at the same time every single day. There was no way on earth I ever thought I’d end up pregnant again.”
She continued, “When I was having my bump scanned, I knew something was up. The nurses went very quiet and were staring at each other, smiling but with a look of disbelief on their face. They told me to look at the screen, and I could see three little babies in there. I just said “Oh my god” and couldn’t believe it – I thought I was in a dream.’”
Fletcher gave birth to her babies, Jorj, Jac and Issac, at eight months and they are totally healthy. She concluded: “Having this many babies takes some getting used to. And they certainly keep me busy but I love my huge brood.”
“According to Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare, with perfect use, the failure rate of the combined pill is 0.3 per cent and with typical use is around nine per cent. Certain medications including some antibiotics or anti epilepsy drugs may reduce the effectiveness of the contraceptive pill and thereby increase the failure rates.
As such, the chance of having a naturally conceived triplet pregnancy is approximately 1 in 6,000 to 8,000 births and even rarer for non-identical triplets.
It is difficult to say whether the getting pregnant on the pill and conceiving a triplet pregnancy are directly related, as the odds of both the events happening concurrently are indeed very low.”