Relieved their pigeon pair have arrived safely, the swim star and his wife are over the moon to introduce them to Jackie Brygel.
His triumphs in the water won him the heart of a nation and saw him hailed our king of distance swimming. But as Grant Hackett now knows, nothing could possibly outshine the moment he first laid eyes on his twins, Jagger Emilio and Charlize Alley.
For when the longed-for son and daughter of Grant and his singer/songwriter wife Candice Alley finally made their arrival into the world by caesarean section after a worrying pregnancy, emotions ran high for the legend of the pool.
“You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t get a tear in your eye at that point. I was certainly like that when I first saw them and got to cut their cords,” Grant, 29, confesses.
“It was so overwhelming. I just wanted everything to be all right, both for the babies and for Candice. Candice was still right in the middle of surgery, so that was a big concern as well.”
“When you see your babies for the first time, it is surreal,” Candice, 27, reflects softly. “You think, ‘They’ve been in my tummy for nine months’, and then to see these little humans that we made ourselves, well, it’s just the most incredible thing to go through. You fall in love with them immediately.”
Born two minutes apart, with Charlize making her entrance ahead of her brother, the pigeon pair are now three weeks old.
And while little Jagger was administered oxygen for the first few days of his life, he and Charlize are now in perfect health.
“Seeing Jagger in the little oxygen tank because he had some fluid on his lungs was hard to digest in the beginning, but he’s fine now,” Grant says. “He’s caught up to his sister really quickly.”
“Even though he was a little smaller when they were born, Jagger has the longest arms — he definitely has Grant’s body,” Candice says.
For the full story see this week’s Woman’s Day, on sale October 5, 2009.
Chorizo & sweet potato tortillas with onion, lime & coriander salad
Reader recipe: Bacon & egg pie by Julie Asher, Parkenham, VIC.
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