AKRON, Ohio, May 12 (UPI) -- Twin girls in Akron, Ohio, were born holding hands.
Sarah Thistlewaite's identical twin daughters, Jenna and Jillian, shared an amniotic sac and placenta in their mother's womb.
They're called "mono mono" twins, a rare condition that occurs in around 1 in 10,000 twin pregnancies.
"I didn't think they would come out and instantly holding hands. It was overwhelming. I can't even put into words," Thistlewaite told ABC News. "There wasn't a dry eye in the whole OR."
Thistlewaite's pregnancy had to be monitored extensively by doctors, who put her on two months of bed rest.
"It's hard with mono mono because you didn't want them to be born too premature," Amy Kilgore, a rep for Akron General Medical Center told Fox 8. "But if they get too big, the umbilical chords can get twisted."
Jenna and Jillian were delivered by planned C-section on May 9, when she was 33 weeks pregnant.
"Sarah was given the option to deliver between 32 and 34 weeks gestation," her doctor, Melissa Mancuso, said of the risky birth. "We were just having a discussion about how difficult a decision it is to make, weighing the risk of prematurity versus the risks of entanglement. She was excited about having her C-section on May 9 because she would be a 'real mother' on Mothers' Day."
