Canadian woman convinced town she was expecting quins

The Quebec town of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu in Canada was rallying behind one of their own residents who had led them to believe she was pregnant with quintuplets.

When the pregnancy was eventually revealed as fake, the community understandably felt betrayed.

The woman, 35 — now undergoing psychiatric care — had kept the story going for months and was only exposed when her delivery date arrived.

Reportedly she told her boyfriend, identified as Paul, that she was pregnant with twins one month after they met on an online dating site. The number of children kept changing, going to triplets, quad-ruplets, and eventually up to quintuplets.

The Toronto Sun reported that when the woman told her friend that she was pregnant, the friend quickly set up a Facebook page so the couple could get assistance from the town. The friend told the paper, “I used my personal and professional contacts to get her sponsorships. Others gave her all sorts of clothes or furniture.”

The duped community offered support to the soon-to-be ‘mother’ by giving her advice as well as countless baby gifts.

Geneviève Laflamme, a mother of triplets, told CTV, “I gave her tips on how to handle it, where to get financial support, where to get sponsors for diapers.” Laflamme grew suspicious as the weeks passed and she detected holes in the woman’s story. Then, a week before the due date, the woman told Laflamme a new ultrasound showed that she was carrying quintuplets. At that point Laflamme stopped believing the woman.

The hoax was finally brought to light when the couple went to the hospital for the delivery at 34 weeks. Canoe News reported that the Paul was taken aside by a nurse and shown results of the woman’s blood test that indicated she was not pregnant. “The doctors told me it was a phantom pregnancy,” Paul said crushed, adding that his now ex-girlfriend was being kept under psychiatric observation.

According to the Toronto Sun, he said his girlfriend’s “…belly swelled, she began lactating and even broke water.”

Gynaecologist Isabelle Girard said the water breaking could have been urinary incontinence.

Relatives told QMI they weren’t surprised to hear that due date came and went with no babies.

“This isn’t the first time she’s done it,” said a male relative. “But honestly, we never would have thought she was sick enough to do it again.”

The family said the woman had once pretended she had leukaemia and has often claimed to suffer afflictions, including heart problems.