Sextuplets still in critical condition after Friday birth

CREVE COEUR, Mo. -- Six babies born minutes apart to an Illinois couple remained hospitalized Sunday in this St. Louis suburb, two days after becoming what may be Missouri's first sextuplets.

The babies -- three boys and three girls born Friday by Caesarean section, 10 weeks early -- all were in critical condition at St. John's Mercy Medical Center, the hospital said.

The mother, 29-year-old Tina Otten, of Granite City, Ill., was in satisfactory condition.

St. John's had said the sextuplets, ranging in weight from 1 pound, 13 ounces to 2 pounds, 15 ounces, were believed to be the state's first, according to information from the Missouri Center for Health Information, Management and Evaluation.

Tina Otten and husband Ron, 33, were told six months ago they'd become parents to sextuplets, though ultrasounds suggested the couple should expect four boys and two girls. The couple had picked names for each child by Friday, only to find that one of the anticipated boys -- he would have been named Nathan -- wasn't a boy after all.

"I said they should put the word 'oops' in her name," Johnnie Reckert, Tina Otten's father, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for a story Sunday.

The Ottens have two other children ages 4 and 2.

When the couple was told last fall that Tina Otten was carrying sextuplets, doctors warned that at least two of the fetuses might not develop and gave the Ottens the choice of having some of the fetuses removed. The couple refused.

"They talked and cried over it a lot," Johnnie Reckert said. "They knew the babies were already alive. There was no way they could do that."

Along the way, relatives said, the Ottens made preparations, with the family helping the couple buy a five-bedroom house that's still being renovated but may be ready when the babies come home.

Tina Otten, a stay-at-home mother who once worked as a nanny, began experiencing contractions about a week ago, though doctors tried to delay delivery so the babies would have more development time, her father said.

When told Friday to get to the hospital to have the babies delivered, the Ottens were stopped on Interstate 64 for speeding by an officer who ultimately let them go with a warning.

Relatives later watched as doctors did one last ultrasound before taking Tina Otten into surgery.

"There were heads, arms and legs all over the place," Johnnie Reckert said.

On the ultrasound, doctors labeled the fetuses with letters. The babies got numbers when they were born before their parents named them.

Each baby is small enough to fit in the palm of their grandfather's hand.