 RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A Virginia hospital says its staff has successfully delivered sextuplets and the three boys and three girls are thriving. Ajibola Taiwo, a native of Western Nigeria, was 30 weeks and two days pregnant when she gave birth to three boys and three girls by cesarean section. The babies ranged in weight from 1 pound, 10 ounces to 2 pounds, 15 ounces. The Taiwos tried to conceive for 17 years and were overcome with joy when they saw four heartbeats at their first ultrasound in November. “For the very first time we were expecting.” 
 
 According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2015 there were nearly 4 million live births in the United States, only 24 of which were quintuplets or other higher order births. Delivering sextuplets requires a coordinated team effort including many hours of planning and simulation.
– A couple who spent 17 years trying to conceive finally managed the feat—six times over. A Virginia hospital says sextuplets born May 11 to Ajibola Taiwo, a native of Nigeria, are "thriving." The three boys and three girls were born via C-section, and weigh between 1 pound, 10 ounces, and 2 pounds, 15 ounces, each. It's the first set of sextuplets born at Richmond's VCU Medical Center, which employed a 40-person team in the birth. And it wasn't just an extremely rare occurrence for the hospital: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention logged only 24 births involving quintuplets or more among the US' almost 4 million live births in 2015, reports the AP. The Times-Dispatch reports Taiwo was 30 weeks and 2 days along at delivery and was released after a week in the hospital. "I hope for the smallest of my six children to grow up and say, 'I was so small, and look at me now,'" she says. A hospital press release explains that four heartbeats appeared during the couple's first ultrasound in November; it wasn't until January that they learned the four heartbeats were actually six. (This birth story garnered extensive press coverage this month, but for tragic reasons.)