The idea of identical twins is fascinating to so many people. As BBC Culture pointed out, the existence of two people who look alike in every way brings up questions about the nature of self and what makes us the people we are. When identical twins also seem to do things in identical ways or experience the same things at the same time, for example — as when they take tests similarly or get into the same number of colleges — it becomes news.
This type of coincidence, if it can be called so, has happened again. Two identical sisters from Pennsylvania, Rebecca Lawrence and Christina Keefer, gave birth last month to their first children on the same day at WellSpan Gettysburg Hospital.
According to a Facebook post from the hospital, Lawrence was scheduled to be induced at the hospital on May 23. Keefer came with her sister and went into labor while she was there.
“Good Morning America” reported that Keefer wasn’t admitted until the next day when her water broke — and both deliveries came a day after that, on May 25. Lawrence’s daughter, Raylynn, was born at 12:07 a.m. at 8 pounds and 3 ounces and 20 inches in length, while Keefer’s son, Xavian, was born that afternoon at 1:17 p.m. He was 8 pounds and 12 ounces and 20.5 inches long.
The sisters, who live 15 minutes apart, went through their pregnancies together as well.
“It was interesting to see the different experiences we were having, like she would have like morning sickness and everything like that, but I didn’t have any,” Lawrence told “GMA.” “And it was nice kind of getting to go through it with somebody else, and then if we had any issues, we could just talk about it.”
They were even placed in rooms next door to one another. Because the babies were born 13 hours apart, they were each able to be in the room when their sister delivered and their families could check on them both at the same time.
The new moms and their babies were released from the hospital within 24 hours of each other, and they were all home to celebrate Keefer and Lawrence’s birthday together on May 29.
Last year, when identical twins Amanda Caston and Julia Baldree gave birth in the same hour in Farragut, Tennessee, WBIR 10 News reported the chances of this happening to twin sisters were about four in 100,000. But it happened earlier this year to Jill Justiniani and Erin Cheplak in Orange County, California, too.
The U.K.’s National Health Service reports that your chances of having identical twins are 1 in 250, which means those moms plus Keefer and Lawrence have been bucking the odds since they were born. Congrats to all of them and their families!
This story originally appeared on Simplemost. Check out Simplemost for additional stories.
