At just 12 months old, Lainey, Kali, Lennon and Koen Bryant are making history — officially recognized by Guinness World Records as the most premature surviving quadruplets.
Becca and Lavareis Bryant welcomed their quads, two boys and a pair of identical twin girls, 115 days early at University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital (UAB) in May 2024. Born at 23 weeks and 4 days gestation — a full-term pregnancy ranges from 39 to 40 weeks — the newborns faced daunting odds, with only a 10% chance that all four would survive.
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WATCH HERE"I call them my miracle babies," Becca Bryant, 30, tells TODAY.com in an exclusive interview.
Lainey was smallest of the bunch, weighing just 1 pound, 4 pounces, while Lennon was the largest at 1 pound, 7 ounces. The siblings spent approximately six months in the neonatal intensive care unit learning to eat and breathe on their own.
The world record for the youngest-ever premature baby to survive is held by Curtis Means, born in 2020 at just 21 weeks and one day of gestation — also at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The Bryants' world record is for the youngest quadruplets.
Natural quadruplets like the Bryants' — conceived without fertility treatments — are exceedingly, rare, occurring in approximately 1 in 700,000 pregnancies, according Dr. Ayodeji Sanusi, the Bryants' maternal-fetal medicine specialist.
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The early labor was triggered when Becca Bryant’s cervix began to shorten. While on bed rest at UAB, her water broke, and soon after, she began showing signs of infection.
“I started getting pretty sick, pretty fast,” Becca Bryant says. “And then it felt like just few minutes later, I was on the operating table. It was pretty emergent.”
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SIGN UP The delivery was a whirlwind, medical staff rushing in and out, each carrying “tiny, tiny” newborns barely bigger than an “Elf on the Shelf,” Becca Bryant recalls.
“It was very fast and furious and scary because I didn’t know what was going on,” she says. “I didn’t get to see them or touch them, and that was really hard.”
“We ended up with about 30 people in the delivery room,” Dr. Colm Travers, a neonatologist at UAB, said in a pre-taped interview provided by the hospital. “Everybody was there to take care of them. It was all hands on deck.”
The quads were admitted to the Golden Week Program, a specialized initiative at UAB aimed at improving outcomes for extremely preterm infants.
According to Travers, the first week of life carries the highest risk of death for these babies.
For 45 agonizing days, Becca Bryant waited to hold each of the quads for the first time. It was a full six months before they were all finally discharged.
Since coming home in December, Lainey, Kali, Lennon and Koen have been showered with endless snuggles. They live in Auburn, Alabama, alongside their older siblings, Kendall, 12; Laikyn, 7; and Kainen, 3.
Lainey remains the smallest, weighing 14 pounds, while Lennon continues to hold the title of biggest at 17 pounds. Becca Bryant describes the quadruplets as “medically fragile,” noting that Lennon relies on a G-tube for feeding, while Lainey and Koen continue to receive oxygen through nasal cannulas. She highlights the remarkable progress they've made, despite these challenges.
“The fact that they’re able to eat a bottle is a really big deal,” Bryant says. She adds that Lainey and Koen are slowly being weaned off the amount of oxygen they require.
Understanding their medical needs comes naturally to Becca Bryant, a registered nurse in the cardiac ICU. Her husband, Lavareis, 40, is a police officer. Together, they manage a bustling household of seven children, including a 3-year-old and four toddlers — with a calm that, to friends, makes it all look easy.
“People tell us, ‘If anyone was supposed to have quads, it was y'all,’” Becca Bryant says with a laugh. “We’re both very laid-back and chill, we just handle what needs to be handled. In my job and my husband’s job, you don’t have time to panic. You have to react quickly, and keep moving.”
Becca Bryant praises the older children for stepping up, often helping with diaper changes — an average of 40 a day. The family also does two loads of laundry daily, just for the babies alone.
Becca Bryant sees the Guinness World Record as a testament to the quadruplets’ strength and resilience. The previous record had been held for nearly 30 years by the Tepper quadruplets, born in 1997.
“They’re getting this big, huge award that they can hang on the wall and tell people about one day,” she says, her voice full of pride. “They fought so hard, and they've come so far."
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