Oregon resident Rachel Ridgeway and her husband Philip Ridgeway have four children, but decided to have another.
They decided to “adopt” embryos that were frozen after being conceived over 30 years ago.
The twins, of frozen embryo origin, were born on October 31, 2022. They were conceived when their birth mother was three years old, and their dad was five years old.
How could this happen? It’s mind-boggling, says the dad.
The 30-year freeze of the embryos appears to have established a new record for the longest-frozen embryos to result in a successful birth. The embryos were kept in liquid nitrogen at around -200 F in April, 1992.
According to the National Embryo Donation Center (NEDC), a private, faith-based organization that claims to have assisted in the birth of more than 1,200 children from donated embryos, the Ridgeways established a new record.
Another birth of frozen embryo origin, Molly Gibson, held the previous record for NEDC. She was born from a 27-year-old frozen embryo in 2020. Dr. John David Gordon, who carried out the embryo transfer, stated that adopting frozen embryos “should encourage patients who question if someone would be prepared to adopt the embryos that they developed 5, 10, or 20 years ago. That’s a resounding yes,” he says.
The Ridgeway couple’s twin embryos were produced through IVF from an unnamed pair. The male donor, who was in his 50s, apparently relied on an egg donor who was 34 years old. The two donated the embryos to the NEDC in Knoxville, Tennessee so that another couple could someday utilize them, they had previously stored them at a reproductive facility on the US west coast.
The embryos were thawed and transferred to Ridgeway’s uterus at Southeastern Fertility, a partner facility of the NEDC.
Jim Toner, MD, an Atlanta fertility physician, said, ”It doesn’t seem like a sperm or an egg or embryo stored in liquid nitrogen ever experiences time. It’s like that Rip Van Winkle thing. It just wakes up 30 years later, and it never knew it was asleep.”
The father, Philip Ridgeway, told CNN that it’s amazing that his newborn twins were actually conceived when he himself was five years old. He said that even though the twins are his youngest children, in a way they are also the couple’s oldest children.