A couple in Kirinyaga county welcomes triplets after three miscarriages

A couple in Kirinyaga county welcomes triplets after three miscarriages.

Grace Wambui, 32, dropped out of school after being partially blind. It is during this stay away from school that she met the love of her life Peter Muthii whom she agreed to marry.

They were blessed with their 12 year old daughter who is in class seven at the moment.

Wambui and her husband Muthii are casual labourers in nearby French bean shambas, where the pay is very little-make sh300 a day.

When she attended antenatal clinic at the Kerugoya referral hospital this January, she was told she was carrying triplets, news that shocked her.

She was lost in thoughts on how her life has drastically changed-have additional mouths to feed yet we are struggling to feed ourselves.

“We were three in our home, now additional three have come how is life going to be like, we are  casual labourers who are struggling to make ends meet” said Wambui.

Wambui already had three miscarriages for the twelve years she has been married though she had planned to have just one more child and concentrate on bringing up the two-but now they are four.

 She said that on April 22, during the antenatal clinic visit at the Kerugoya referral where she had been sent to where she developed a sharp pain on her lower belly and at the back, where she was wheeled to the maternity ward.

“I felt a sharp pain on my lower abdomen and at the back, the nurses had to wheel me to the maternity ward since I could not stand or even feel my legs” said Wambui.

In her lineage, her grandmother who she is named after had twins-cleared her thoughts but maintains she would have given birth to two and not three just like her grandmother.

”I would have given birth to twins since my grandmother had twins-triplets were a shock to me” Wambui added.

She woke up to be informed by her doctor that she had delivered three identical girls.

Sharteen Nyakio, Shantel Nyambura and Sharon Nyawira weighed 1.57kg, 1.57kg and 1.56kg, respectively. All were underweight and had to be put in incubators.

"I could not believe it until I saw them. I was told the babies were in good condition but they had to remain in the incubators for a whole month until each attained two kilos of weight," said Wambui.

"I was upset and many things went through my mind when I saw the babies. My biggest concern is finances, at the moment my husband is the one working as I look after the newborns" she said.

At the moment,Wambui is at her parents' home in Kirimunge village with her babies as a big space is needed and when she approached her parents, they did not turn her down.

"Life is becoming very difficult for us, I  plan to stay with my parents until the babies stop breast-feeding” she said.

"I will go back to our house when the babies stop breastfeeding, the milk for the three is not even enough, though my parents are equally poor, they have a big room for me and my babies," she said. I appeal to well-wishers and the government for assistance.

"What we need most at the moment is milk and clothes," she added.

"My in-laws understand the problem I'm facing and that is why they have temporarily accommodated my wife and the babies," said Mr Muthii.

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