ZEELAND, Mich. — Some might say raising one toddler is a challenge. How about raising multiple toddlers all at the same? That’s what one West Michigan couple is doing, and you may be surprised by just how many. They say it’s tough, but that they wouldn’t change a thing.
“Once the shock wore off – well, it didn’t really ever wear off,” said Rachael Schisler. She and her husband, Dr. Jake Schisler, are raising not one, not two, not three, but six toddlers.
“Had our twins in 2020 and then the quadruplets in 2022. So, it’s just been a crazy ride since then,” said Rachael.
The two met while on the swim team at Albion College. They now live in Zeeland, and say they’d always planned to have somewhat of a big family.
Rachael told 13 ON YOUR SIDE, “We thought we would have like three to four kids. Obviously, we weren’t thinking it would be all at the same time.”
Jake said, “Don’t know that I would have ever said I wanted six, but you know four was probably more what we were thinking. So, once we had the twins, we were like, ‘okay, even if we have twins again, it’ll be okay,’ and then we got four more.”
Rachael went on to explain, “We were doing fertility treatments. So, we kind of expected twins.”
That’s exactly what happened the first time around. Two years later, a trip to the doctor’s office would bring an even bigger surprise.
“In the ultrasound, they were like, ‘oh, there’s three,’ and then she was like ‘well, wait, there’s four.’ That was very shocking,” she said laughing. “Jake started laughing and I was like it’s really not funny. That car ride home we were both like very silent.”
Adding twins and quadruplets to already very busy lives.
“Knowing we were going to have multiples, we knew how important having a schedule and keeping them together on the same schedule was going to be because if it was always somebody was trying to eat or things were just going off, it was just going to be way too hard for us to manage,” said Jake.
Both work full-time jobs. Rachael is a teacher. Jake is a dentist.
“The Army paid for me to go to dental school. So, once I graduated from dental school, I worked as an active-duty dentist for four years down in Georgia and then once I got off of active duty, I now transitioned and I’m in the National Guard,” he explained.
Add father of six girls to the list.
The girls’ names are Harper, Raegan, Emersyn, Layla, Rylee and Ella.
“They’re all fraternal. So, they all have their very, very different personalities, which is really cool,” said Jake.
Rachael said, “We’ve got like feisty; we’ve got very “Type A”; we’ve just got fun and wild. So, very different.”
“Now, the twins being four and being a little bit older. Watching them and the way that they love on each other but then the way they care for their little sisters, and when they want to read a book, they try to get the babies to crawl up on their lap and snuggle and it’s really cute just watching,” said the proud father.
Rachael said, “At the very beginning when they were born, it was very hard to tell them apart. If we look back, even at pictures, I would label the pictures of their names because if I look at it now I’ll be like, ‘uh, who is that? Which one is that?’”
It’s not easy, but they say they’d never give it up.
“When you think about your life and like how are you going to do it, how are you going to survive, and you just do it every single day and it works,” said Rachael.
The dynamic girl dad that he is, Jake said, “The one thing that people kind of get caught up on is just – holy cow, that’s really hard and it’s crazy, and it is. It’s stressful but it’s just such a blessing. God has blessed us so much and we love this family. We wouldn’t ask for anything different. It’s not what envisioned but it’s what he gave us and we love it and we wouldn’t trade it, any of it for the world.”
Both parents are just 33 years old, by the way, and in addition to the many responsibilities on their plates, they’re also still very physically active and like to work out.
They say something that really helped them adjust are the nurses at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital. They say those nurses helped take care of the quadruplets for several weeks after they were born and before they were able to go home. The parents say the nurses helped to get the babies on a steady eating and napping schedule and that helped a lot.