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A mother with two wombs gave birth to twins that have different skin colours.
25-year-old Jade Buckingham was shocked when her two new babies arrived with different skin colours, and the doctors were quite surprised by it as well.
Lanaé and Lavell were born four years ago in 2018, but as they were welcomed into the world it was noticed that they have ‘totally different’ skin tones.
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The pair were formed out of two completely separate eggs in Jade’s two completely separate wombs, which is rare enough in itself, but for them to then have two totally different skin colours is almost completely unheard of.
Both had their own umbilical cord and amniotic sac, too.
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Jade’s rare condition was discovered back in 2014, when at the age of 17 she’d had four miscarriages that left her needing a dilation and curettage (D&C) procedure to clear the uterine lining following a miscarriage.
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During that time, they discovered that Jade had a vaginal septum, which is a partition that splits the vagina into two parts.
Doctors believe that Jade was born with this and warned her that it might have been responsible for her miscarriages, and could prevent her from having children in future.
That was, of course, a huge blow for her. But just a year after the last miscarriage she was pregnant with her first son, Cairo.
Then, in 2017, she fell pregnant with the twins.
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She said: "I was distraught because I'd always wanted to be a mum.
"My own mum, Sheena, 42, said she'd be my surrogate if I needed which was a lovely gesture, but I wanted to experience pregnancy.
''When I fell pregnant with the twins I was over the moon - but it was scary that they were both in different wombs.
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"As newborns, they looked similar but after a few months their different skin tone and features began to show through."
She continued: "I was, of course, over the moon because I was loving being a mum to Cairo.
''I'd always worried it might not happen for me and then to have him alive and well, it was everything I'd ever wanted.
''Due to my two wombs, I had scans every two weeks to monitor the twins' development.
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''It was at the first-trimester appointment at 12 weeks that I found out that the twins were growing in separate uteruses meaning that they had formed from different eggs.
"The doctors said that I should treat my pregnancy the same as when I carried my son which was a relief, and I appreciated the regular scans."
After 22 weeks, it turned out that Lanaé had stopped growing, and faced the agonising choice of giving birth to both early or potentially losing her.
"It was a horrible predicament to be in but I knew I had to keep on going,” she explained.
''I decided to carry on with the pregnancy and hoped both would be OK, it was such an anxious time.''
At 34 weeks, she went into labour and gave birth via an emergency c-section.
Mercifully, both children – a boy and a girl - were safe.
"I was so relieved when they were both born and safe with me,” Jade said.
"Lanaé was born feet first and Lavell was born headfirst, from that moment I knew that they were going to be polar opposites which they definitely are now.''
Despite not seeming too different at first, as the months passed the differences started to appear.
"When Lanaé's hair started to grow, I noticed that she had lovely dark curls and Lavell had blonde hair and a lighter skin tone,” Jade explained.
"Sometimes when we're out and people ask about them, they don't believe that they're twins and sometimes I show them a picture of when they were born.''
Now, the pair are four-years-old and ‘happy and healthy’.
Those differences are here to stay, though.
Jade said: "Lanaé is like a little doll and she's so lady-like, whereas Lavell is so boisterous with bags of energy.
"They have such a love-hate brother-sister relationship but I wouldn't have them any other way."
Tom Wood