The Walton girls, pictured with their parents Janet and Graham. Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool in 1983, are the only female sextuplets in the world to have survived
Both of them agree it was a momentous day.
But
Janet and Graham Walton, parents of the world’s only all-girl
sextuplets, can’t quite reach a consensus on what was most remarkable
about the October morning last year when they became first-time
grandparents.
Graham remembers the drama and farce.
‘Janet was delayed getting to the hospital because of what I now refer to as the Axminster Incident,’ he says.
‘A
roll of carpet fell off the back of a van in front of her as she was
driving into Liverpool. She was panicking about being late.’
Meanwhile Sarah, the first of their sextuplets to bless them with a grandchild, was caught up in a minor palaver at the hospital.
‘Sarah was being taken to the operating theatre for her Caesarian section when the scrub nurse — or was it the surgeon? — got stuck in the lift with her,’ begins Graham.
‘That lift story’s just wrong on so many levels,’ interrupts Ruth, who, like her father, is a natural joker. ‘Sarah wasn’t stuck in it at all.’
Well, someone involved in the operation was trapped in a lift,’ insists Graham, while Janet — serene, calm and unerringly competent — rolls her eyes and smiles.
She remembers only the everyday wonder of her granddaughter Jorgie’s birth.
‘I’d seen Sarah early in the morning, and an hour and a half later there she was holding her baby, a beautiful little girl with really big, dark eyes and lots of dark hair.
‘It’s a miracle, isn’t it? I took the first photo of Jorgie half an hour after she was born.
The Walton girls, pictured here aged 5, (left to right) Luci, Ruth, Jennie, Hannah, Kate and Sarah
‘She was perfect, so tiny. She weighed 7lb 6½ oz at birth. Sarah was only 2lb 5oz at birth, so her little girl was three times as big as her mum. Yet I couldn’t believe how delicate and small she looked.
‘I felt a tremendous surge of protective love. It flooded into me the moment I saw the pictures from her first scan.
‘I texted all the family: “It’s a girl!” (Well, the Waltons don’t do boys, do we?) I even learnt how to send a group message.
Graham and Janet Walton pictured with their six daughters in 1983, shortly after they were born. After Janet's multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, she spent the rest of her pregnancy in hospital
Apparently, everyone keeps telling Janet, there is ‘no one more experienced at motherhood than you’.
‘But when my girls were born, I knew absolutely nothing,’ she says. ‘I’d had no time to prepare. I hadn’t even seen a midwife or been to an antenatal class. The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into hospital and I stayed there until the birth.’
Janet and Graham had given up hope of conceiving a child of their own. In fact, they were poised to adopt — believing the fertility drug she had been taking would never work — when she became pregnant with six girls.
Janet, Graham and their daughters are seen here aged 11, getting ready for their first day of secondary school. Janet and Graham had given up hope of having children when they found out Janet was pregnant
The sextuplets, Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool on November 18, 1983, remain unique — no other set of female sextuplets has ever survived — and the world has watched them grow to adulthood with thrilled wonderment.
Those of us who have experienced parenthood on a more modest scale can only marvel at the epic task that confronted Janet and Graham after they were born.
When Jorgie was born to Sarah and her fiance Kieran, a restaurant manager, on October 7 last year, Janet’s mind cast back to the day, 31 years earlier, when she became a mum.
Sarah (left) with mother, Janet (right) and baby Jorgie. Until recently Janet was working as a fund-raising administrator for the neo-natal unit at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, where Jorgie was born in October 2014
‘Jorgie was born on a Tuesday, and by Friday she was home. In contrast, it was six weeks before our girls came home — they’d been in the special care baby unit — and we brought them back two at a time,’ Janet remembers.
‘From the start, it was absolutely full-on. Daunting.
‘Looking back, I don’t know how we managed; honestly I don’t.
‘We lived through those early years in a blur. We had no time to think. We were just doing. And the only regret is that there wasn’t enough time to enjoy them as much as we’d have liked.
The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into hospital and I stayed there until the birth.
Janet Walton
‘When Sarah says: “Jorgie was awake in the night. I’m so tired!” I don’t say anything, but I remember back to our girls’ early years. For two years, Graham and I only slept for a couple of hours a night. It was very difficult, a constant round of nappy-changing and feeding. And we couldn’t learn from our mistakes because we experienced everything at once: the weaning, the potty-training, the first steps. It was a constant onslaught.’
‘We worked out that we used 11,000 nappies a year,’ chips in Graham, 64, who took a year off from his job as a painter and decorator when his daughters were born, to help look after them.
Now, equipped with three decades worth of anecdotes on sharing a house with seven females, he also gives after‑dinner talks.
‘We used to get through cases of talcum powder,’ he says. ‘It was as foggy as Victorian London in our house when they were babies. But they don’t use talc now, do they?’
He seems mildly put out that those days when the air was dense with powder will for ever be consigned to sensory memory. But it gets him reminiscing.
Graham Walton (pictured with his six daughters and wife), now gives after-dinner talks on what life's been like living with seven women in the house
‘Just because we had six babies at once, it didn’t mean we were imprisoned in the house,’ he recalls. ‘We got out. Jan and I both took a double buggy and a baby each in a papoose. If anyone was visiting, they’d push the third double buggy.
‘I loved those early years so much. I couldn’t say one phase was better than the others. But there was always so much to do, we didn’t enjoy it as much as we would if we’d had one at a time. With grandchildren, you have time.’
Looking fondly at his granddaughter, he adds: ‘Whenever I see little babies, I wish I could go back and do it all over again.’
Graham and Janet (pictured) say that having six babies didn't stop them from leaving the house when the girls were little, they would use two double buggies and a papoose each to transport the sextuplets
Janet, 62, looks stricken. She has just retired from her job as fund-raising administrator for the neo-natal unit at Liverpool Women’s Hospital (Jorgie was born there) and is looking forward to the novelty of devoting some of her spare time to just their one cherished grandchild.
‘There’s nothing quite like being a grandma, is there?’ she says. ‘I think you do have the best of them and I feel privileged.
‘Right from the start I’ve had a bond with Jorgie.
Janet drove Sarah (pictured with Jorgie) and her fiancee, Kieran, to their first scan at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, where she worked until recently
‘Kieran and Sarah came round when she was just a few weeks pregnant and said: “We’ve got some exciting news.” There was this big love-in, lots of cuddles, when she said she was pregnant. And because I worked at the hospital, I drove them in for Sarah’s first scan at eight weeks. Kieran popped his head round my door and said: “Come and have a look at this.” It was such a miracle. I saw the scan picture. There she was: a proper little baby. I had a cry.
‘Hopefully I’ll be there for some more milestones. It was fabulous to see Jorgie’s first smile; I think she recognises voices now. She seems to change every day, and she’s so content.
‘She’s joined the library, she goes swimming — it tickles me — Sarah takes her to a little baby group with other new mums. She already has a busy social life.
The sisters (pictured) grew up in a seven-bedroom house in Wallasey, Merseyside, where their parents still live. Apart from Jennie, who lives in Leeds, all the girls still live close to their parents
‘The first time I babysat I was a little bit apprehensive, but it’s instinctive. You just remember what to do. And I tell Sarah: “There’s no right or wrong way.” I never push my views.
‘I chat away to Jorgie when I’m looking after her: “Auntie Kate will be coming later,” or “I wonder what your Mummy’s doing now?” It doesn’t really matter what you say as long as you’re engaging them.
‘And I’ve already bought her a book of stories and nursery rhymes because there’s nothing more rewarding than snuggling them down in bed and reading to them.’
Honestly, I just don’t know how they did it. Everyone says: “It’ll be nice for Jorgie to have a brother” but I definitely don’t want six. I couldn’t cope!
Sarah Walton
When I visit, all the sisters have convened at the family home, the warm and welcoming seven-bedroom house in Wallasey, Merseyside, where they grew up. It’s the third time I’ve visited them and I never fail to think how different, how fiercely individual, they all are.
All but Hannah have moved away now. But apart from Jennie — who lives with partner Matt, a catering manager, in Leeds — they all live within a stone’s throw of Mum and Dad’s.
‘I can’t remember a time when the house ever felt empty. There’s always someone dropping by for tea,’ says Jan, who seems perpetually to keep a vast vat of food bubbling on the hob.
Meanwhile, Jorgie, sweet-tempered and quick to smile, is being passed between her doting aunts like a parcel in a party game. ‘She’s just enveloped in all this love,’ smiles Jan. ‘I’m sure she’ll develop great social skills, too, because we talk to her all the time.’
Sarah, practical and sensible like her mum, worked as an administrator in a medical centre before she had Jorgie. Now she’s taking a year’s maternity leave. She and Kieran have just bought their first house together. ‘Eventually we’ll get married,’ she says.
‘I wouldn’t bother if I were you. You can live in sin with my blessing and save me a few bob,’ jokes Graham.
Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate and Jennie (pictured here with Sarah in 1987) are all thrilled to be aunts to Sarah's baby, Jorgie, although they have mixed views on who'll be next to have a baby
When his girls were newborns, any visitor was presented with a baby and a nappy to change because the practical tasks were relentless. Jorgie, by contrast, is overwhelmed with attention.
‘We try to give everyone a turn to cuddle,’ says Sarah, who reflects on what life must have been like for her mum and dad with the six of them and only two pairs of hands.
‘Honestly, I just don’t know how they did it. Everyone says: “It’ll be nice for Jorgie to have a brother” but I definitely don’t want six. I couldn’t cope!’ wails Sarah.
‘You would if you had to,’ says Graham. ‘Granted, it would be a bit frightening, but you’d just get on with it.’
Despite growing up in such a large family, Jennie, Sarah, Luci, Hannah, Ruth and Kate (left to right, aged 11) all agree that having six children of their own would be too many
The consensus among the girls is that six children would be far too many, even if they came along one at a time.
‘I can’t wait to have one — or maybe two. But no more than that,’ says Ruth who works in PR and reception at a shopping centre and will marry Rob, a civil servant, later this year.
Luci, funny and exuberant, is a cabin crew member with an airline, and has been engaged for six years to Paul, a bakery supervisor. But she isn’t ready for motherhood yet. ‘No way!’ she protests.
Hannah, cool, calm and organised, is a primary school teacher. She has a partner, Steve, manager of a recruitment agency, but she’s living with Mum and Dad; saving up, biding her time.
Sarah (pictured) takes Jorgie to a baby group with other new mums so she has a busy social life already!
Kate, often miscast as ‘the serious one’, actually has a quiet and quirky sense of humour. She works in human resources and says: ‘I’m not really very maternal.’ But she’s still single. That could change.
Quick-witted and sparky Jennie, who runs her own sweet shop, says: ‘You have to find the man you want to spend the rest of your life with before you have babies, don’t you?’
Janet presides serenely over the hubbub of chatter. ‘When I had the girls, people said: “It couldn’t have happened to a better person. You’re so sensible, organised and calm.”
‘Perhaps I’ve been a bit too sensible with Jorgie. She had so many pretty clothes, so I bought her a savings bond — and a cot. All the girls will get a cot. We’ve always tried to treat them fairly.
‘But now I’m thinking: “One day, before I die, I’ll do something mad, something utterly out of character.”’
‘How about a tattoo? Or sky-diving?’ offers Jennie.
‘Oh, I’m not telling anyone what it’ll be,’ says Janet cryptically.
She’d better be quick about it. This time next year there could be another batch of grandchildren on the way; another frenetic round of babysitting and nappy-changing.
Meanwhile, I ask what her hopes are for her adored first grandchild, and she replies: ‘I’m looking forward to her being part of my future, to noticing all the tiny changes that happen every day; to having time to savour and enjoy every minute I spend with her.
‘I wish her happiness, health and a long, fruitful life. And who knows?’ she smiles, ‘Perhaps six little brothers as well.’
Six Little Miracles: The heartwarming true story of raising the world’s first sextuplet girls, by Janet Walton with Robert Ettinger, is published next Thursday, by Ebury Press.