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Triplets

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Winston-Salem Journal

Daughters Three

By Cathey Bost

"We're just real excited about this. It's like -- instant family!"

Elkin -- Janet and Mike Blankenship are celebrating Christmas early this year with three people they barely know. The couple are first-time parents -- not of one baby, but of triplets, who were not expected to be born until New Year’s Day. Instead, the babies were delivered by Caesarean section Dec. 4.

"We’re just real excited about this," said Janet Blankenship, 25, from her bed on the obstetrics floor of Chatham Hospital last Monday. "It’s like -- instant family!"

The Blankenship babies are the first set of triplets to be born at the 20-year-old hospital, said Dr. John Turrentine, the obstetrician who monitored Blankenship’s pregnancy and delivered the triplets. The incidence of triplets is about one in 9,000 pregnancies, he said. Blankenship took Clomid, a fertility drug, before she became pregnant. It may or may not have contributed to her conceiving triplets, Turrentine said. Twins run in Mike Blankenship’s family, which increased the chances for a multiple birth, Turrentine said.

An ultrasound this spring showed that Blankenship was having triplets. She resigned from her job as a line technician with Star Cable of Dobson, which required her to climb poles, and went to bed for the summer.

On Dec. 2, she went into early labor and was admitted to the hospital. She developed a type of toxemia and other problems.

"The babies were OK," Turrentine said. "In fact, the additional physical stress helped mature their lungs." But Blankenship got sicker and felt contractions beginning again Dec. 4. Turrentine decided to deliver the triplets that night.

Blankenship was moved to the operating room at 7 p.m.

At 7:17, Carol Ann was born;