SignalHub-'One in a million': Alabama woman pregnant with 2 babies in 2 uteruses due on Christmas

An Alabama woman born with two uteruses recently got the shock of her life: She's due to deliver a baby from each of her wombs on SignalHubChristmas day.

Kelsey Hatcher, 32, learned of her condition, known as uterus didelphys, when she was 17 but it hasn't impacted her life until now.

She and her husband Caleb, who live just outside of Birmingham in Dora, already had three kids and thought they were done having children when she learned she was pregnant in May, Hatcher first shared with TODAY.

"There’s only one baby in there, right?" she joked with her doctor at her eight-week ultrasound.

"As soon as she moved the ultrasound wand across my belly, I said, 'Oh my gosh, there’s another one. Oh my gosh.' She said, 'Yes! There is,'" the expectant mom told TODAY. "I was just in complete shock and think for the first, I don’t know, two to three weeks, my husband and I just laughed."

Hatcher spoke with USA TODAY on Wednesday and shared her progress, how she's feeling and how she plans on life with two newborns and three other children.

See also:Louisiana couple gives birth to rare 'spontaneous' identical triplets

How rare is Kelsey Hatcher's pregnancy?

The pregnancy is "one in a million," Dr. Richard Davis told WVTM-TV in Alabama.

Davis is a maternal and fetal medicine specialist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham's Women & Infants Center, where Hatcher is due to deliver on Christmas day.

Hatcher's pregnancy is so uncommon, "some OB/GYNs go their whole careers without seeing anything like this," Dr. Shweta Patel, an OB/GYN who is part of a team of doctors preparing for Hatcher's delivery, told WVTM-TV.

It's "very, very rare," Patel said.

Hatcher's pregnancy is a first for the team at the hospital. They're relying on "baseline teaching and baseline knowledge," Patel told Good Morning America.

While twin pregnancies aren't rare, Hatcher's type is because she ovulated separately, with each egg traveling down each side of the uterus and the sperm traveling up each uterus, and fertilization occurring in both.

"Because my cycles have always worked together as one, I assumed as I ovulated on one side ... and there would be no chance of having a baby in the opposite uterus," Hatcher told USA TODAY. "I never would have thought I would ovulate from both at the same time."

How is Kelsey Hatcher feeling?

Hatcher's doctors have shared the risks of miscarriage or preterm labor with her, but so far, so good.

"Overall, I am feeling great," she told USA TODAY. "I’m definitely slowing down and feeling the toughness of pregnancy. However, I’ve continued to work my job as a massage therapist and kept myself active in the gym at least four days a week. I believe those are huge contributors to my feeling so well for so long."

At 35 weeks, both babies are developing normally. The tricky part will be delivery, as it's unclear whether or not the babies will arrive around the same time.

Pregnant while already pregnant?It's rare, but it can happen.

What can Kelsey Hatcher expect for delivery

When Hatcher goes into labor, Davis said that her medical team will have to monitor each uterus to see which is contracting, "and if they’re doing sort of almost the same or they’re different."

One baby could be born vaginally and the other via C-section.

"It's so unpredictable, and that's why we've had a lot of conversations with Kelsey kind of talking about the different scenarios that could happen," Patel said.

It's possible only one uterus will contract. The other may not follow until weeks after.

Are the babies considered twins then? Since Hatcher's situation is such a medical anomaly, doctors don't have any other way of describing it "besides still calling them twins," Patel said.

Hatcher's concern isn't so much about delivery, but the family dynamic after the babies arrive and how she'll manage everything with the couple's other three children, who are 2, 4 and 7.

"The thought of managing five children, two being newborns, is an overwhelming feeling for me," she told USA TODAY. "I’m preparing to just take it one day at a time and do the best I can."