When you have five children – one set of triplets and one set of twins, born only months apart, what’s adding one more to the clan? Come and find out as we sit down with the Justice family, who recently welcomed their sixth child and first non-multiple to their gorgeous group. With five toddlers and one newborn, things are bound to get interesting…
A Tulsa, Oklahoma, couple have gone from zero children to five in less than a year after they adopted triplets then fell pregnantwith twins. After struggling to conceive, Sarah and Andy Justice went to see a specialist who told them would cost them up to $60,000 and they’d still have just a 10 per cent chance of getting pregnant. So, they told Tulsa World, they decided to adopt, and after an arduous time they were matched with a soon-to-be mother. However, when Sarah took the birth mother for an ultrasound, the doctor had a surprise – not one but three babies were on the way. ‘Wow! This is great,’ thought the couple, who knew they wanted more children but didn’t want to go through the exhausting adoption process again. ‘It’s everything we wanted.’ The babies – Joel, Hannah and Elizabeth – were born premature but healthy nine months ago, and were still in neonatal intensive care when Sarah and Andy had their second surprise. Sarah was pregnant. Two months later, at a sonogram to find out the sex of the new baby, Sarah called Andy. ‘One is a boy,’ she said. ‘One!?’ he exclaimed. He had in fact been joking that they would probably have twins, but never for a minute thought it would actually happen. ‘That’ll teach me to keep my mouth shut,’ he told, laughing. ‘No, really, we were very happy. Did we panic a little? Of course. But we were very happy.’
Abigail and Andrew were born healthy and are almost eight weeks. Sarah said even if they knew they’d have their own biological children, they’d never give up their triplets. And Andy believes the twins may not have even come along had the adoption not panned out so well and taken away the stress they’d been under. He said:” Maybe it’s all connected. While not getting much sleep and saying ‘we don’t sit down much either,’ the family get a lot of help from their tight-knit community.” Friends and family have set up a weekly rotation to help Sarah while Andy is at work and their congregation at Eastland Baptist Church have kept them fed with homecooked meals. And they say the babies go through 40 to 50 diapers a day – or 300 a week – but they’ve all been donated so far.
Sarah admits:” Having five in toddler beds is an adventure. But we are getting there.” It’s clear the Justice family enjoy spending time together and a typical day involves a morning walk, followed by playtime with relatives and friends and household chores together. While the routine is quite structured , Sarah says that toilet training has definitely thrown her a bit of a curve ball. Sarah said:” Potty breaks are a big part of our day when you have five children at the same life stage.” But a family that toilet trains together, stays together and Sarah absolutely adores having a large family with siblings so close together.
Sarah added:” We never lack playmates and work to promote love and care between the siblings. Our children will always have a friend and will never need to feel lonely.” And while Caleb may be younger by a couple of years, he hasn’t had a problem fitting into the swing of things. “All of the kids absolutely adore their ‘baby Caleb’”, Sarah tells us. “He has the best fan club ever and we cannot imagine life without the sweetest, most loved little guy in the world.”
