65-Year-Old Grandmother Gives Birth To Quadruplets: Already Had 13 Children, Seven Grandchildren

The question on social media is why would a 65-year-old grandmother, who already had 13 children and seven grandchildren, want four more children? Annegret Raunigk, of Germany, just gave birth to quadruplets, making her the oldest woman ever to do so, according to CNN.

For many people, 13 children would be more than enough, but Raunigk added three more boys and one more girl to her total. That means her seven grandchildren are older than the four newborns.

To top it off, Raunigk is a single mother, and her 13 children range in age from 10 to 44, and they are from five different fathers. This time, Raunigk became pregnant by in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments. She traveled abroad to have donated, fertilized eggs implanted because this procedure is illegal in Germany.

The babies were born under 26 weeks and delivered by a C-section. They are being kept in incubators since they are premature.

“Raunigk named her new babies Neeta, Dries, Bence and Fjonn who weighed between one pound, seven ounces and two pounds, two ounces each.”

This is not the only time the language teacher from Berlin has made headlines. Ten years ago, when she was 55, Raunigk gave birth to a daughter, Leila. And it was this daughter’s plea for a younger sibling that encouraged her mother to try again.

“I myself find life with children great. You constantly have to live up to new challenges. And that probably also keeps you young.”

That means that when Raunigk is 70 years old, she will have children in kindergarten. The youngsters’ teachers and friends will probably think of the single mom as the grandmother to the quadruplets instead of their own mother.

Raunigk had her first child at 21 the natural way. This current pregnancy was widely criticized by medical professionals because of Raunigk’s age. They questioned whether her body would be physically capable of bearing four children. One doctor tried to persuade her to abort one or two of the fetuses, but she refused to even consider it.

“They can see it how they want to, and I’ll see it the way I think is right.”

The babies’ mother is said to be doing well, and the children stand a strong chance of survival, but possible complications couldn’t yet be ruled out since they were born prematurely.

WTVR reported that while this might seem strange, Raunigk is not the oldest woman to give birth, even though she is the oldest woman to give birth to four babies at once.

That record for the oldest mother is held by Rajo Devi Lohan, an Indian woman who at 70 became the world’s oldest known first time mother after three rounds of IVF. Her daughter, Naveen, will turn 7 later this year, and her mother will turn 77.

Hopefully, Leila won’t ask for more siblings. Do you think a woman should have four babies at 65?

[Image via Getty Images]