When you think of twins, you expect that one follows the other in being born just a matter of minutes later. Of course, you might say that it takes an hour or perhaps two at the most. If you discover that twins are born on different days, then you simply think that they were born either side of midnight and it doesn’t confuse the mind.

But in 2012, something completely different happened in the UK.

A couple were celebrating the fact that they were going to have twins when the mother went into labor early, four months early to be more precise. As a result, one twin was born premature even though she was told that there was a very good chance that both would die.

As it turned out, the other twin decided that it was not time for her to make an appearance to the world just yet, so while her twin sister fought for her life in a special baby unit, she stayed there quite content.

It was not until after 36 weeks that the doctors decided that it was safe to induce the pregnancy so she could give birth to the second twin, but if nature had been left to take its course, the record would be even longer.

At the end of the day, there was a total of 87 days between the births of the twins, setting a new record that had stood since the 1990s.