Australia, meet Erin and Abby Delaney, the 15-month-old twin sisters who’ve endured enough surgeries to last anyone a lifetime.
You see, Erin and Abby were born conjoined at the head, their skulls attached, sharing a single crucial vein that circulates blood between their brains and their hearts.
Erin and Abby with their mum, Heather.
It’s been a tiring, yet hopeful 15 months for the youngsters and their doting parents, Heather and Riley, with Heather delivering the twins prematurely via C-section so doctors could begin planning the monumental task of separating these baby girls safely.
According to The Washington Post, on June 6 of this year, it took a team of 30 doctors and nurses, working for 11 hours, to separate connected-at-the-head Abby and Erin.
And now, as told by ABC News, these two little warriors are being discharged from hospital.
Erin and Abby with their mum and dad, Heather and Riley.
The girls need skin expansions inserted in their skulls prior to their separation surgery.
“The weeks after the girls’ separation were filled with many terrifying moments,” Heather, who’s started a GoFundMe page to raise money for the girls’ ongoing health needs, wrote on her blog.
“I know that when you see stories of conjoined twins being separated it’s so exciting and everyone is so happy. I wasn’t able to have that moment for a while.”
“When dealing with the brain things can change in an instant and because of that I lived at the hospital for the first almost month after the girls were separated.”
Riley holding Abby for the first time since the separation surgery.
Not only that, but the girls have faced health setbacks, with Heather saying “their little bodies are getting colds and sicknesses” since being moved from the ICU to occupational therapy rooms.
“Whenever they aren’t in rehab getting their therapies it is a setback as to when we can go home,” Heather continues.
“And poor Abby just can’t seem to catch a break. She has had a respiratory virus 3 times (Erin twice, me once), Erin had the flu (Abby and I escaped that one thank God), and then just this past week Abby got a weird blood infection that caused her to go into septic shock, landing her yet another stay in the ICU.”
“This last one scared me I am not going to lie. She was really really sick for a few days there. She got 2 CTs, an MRI, a bunch of spinal taps, and every type of blood test in the book, and they still don’t know where in her body the infection was coming from or how she picked it up.”
The two girls are coming leaps and bounds thanks to their rehab therapy.
Abby and Erin living their separate lives.
Here’s wishing these two fighters a long, happy and healthy future!
h/t The Washington Post.
