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Mom Battling Cancer Gives Birth to Naturally Conceived Quadruplets: My Family ‘Is Pushing Me Forward’

Doctors put the odds of conceiving quadruplets naturally at 1 in 700,000 — which makes Kayla and Charles Gaytran very, very special. The mom and dad from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, welcomed four healthy babies, Lillian, Victoria, Charles and Michael on December 30, 2016. But their story is bittersweet. Listen to Kayla talk about her experience in the video above.

Kayla Gaytran

Kayla was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in January 2016 and was in remission after five months of chemotherapy when she found out she was pregnant. “We were told we probably wouldn’t be able to have any kids after I finished treatment,” the 29-year-old tells Us Weekly in a new interview. “Then I go in for an ultrasound and find out that there are four sacks in there!” 

Related: PHOTOS: Celebrity Babies 2016

Charles, a U.S. Army sergeant, admits he was terrified when his wife of one year called him at work with the big news. “It was a mixture of every possible emotion you could think of,” he tells Us. “It went from ‘This is the scariest thing ever’ to ‘This is the best thing that has ever happened to us.’”

Then in November, Kayla began noticing familiar symptoms of her blood cancer. “She had a couple of lymph nodes that were swelling up,” says Charles, 26. “And she also had what’s called the Hodgkin’s itch, which is basically an itch throughout your entire body.”

A biopsy confirmed what Kayla suspected: Her cancer had returned. “It was the worst news I’ve ever had in my life,” Charles tells Us. “She’s my best friend, my wife, the most amazing person I’ve ever met, and to hear those words come out, ‘It’s back,’ it broke my heart.”

Charles Gaytran
Charles Gaytran

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Though Kayla had hoped to carry the quadruplets to 34 weeks, they were delivered via caesarean section at 30 weeks into the pregnancy at the urging of her medical team. “It was one of the greatest moments of my life, just to hear them all cry,” gushes Charles. “I was just thanking God.”

❤️❤️

A post shared by Kayla (@kaylagaytan8) on

Kayla, who is also mom of Ethan, 12, and Harper, 2, will begin chemotherapy this month. According to WKRN.com, her treatment is supposed to last for about 16 months. Doctors have given her a 50 percent chance of survival over the next five years. Kayla is determined to live. “I have six kids, and I have my husband, and they’re really what’s pushing me forward,” she tells Us. “I wanna show them how strong their mom can be.”

Charles set up a GoFundMe to help cover the family’s medical expenses.

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