It is almost a knee-jerk reaction for people when they encounter infants of any age to comment on their size. That’s true whether they are marveling at their teeny-tiny feet or pinching chubby cheeks. But no age gets it more than a newborn. Although OBGYNs and labor and delivery nurses have seen it all when it comes to little ones, the staff at an upstate New York hospital got the surprise of their lives right at the beginning of 2026.
They say everything is bigger in Texas, but New York may just have that state beat in the baby department. On January 30, 2026, the maternity unit at Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca welcomed two wildly different children in what proved to be a beautiful display of diversity. While parents Chloe and Victor delivered a tiny newborn baby weighing only 4 pounds, just up the hall, parents Terrica and Shawn set a whole new record for the hospital with baby boy Shawn Jr.
According to People, the not-so-little man was born at a whopping 13 pounds, earning him the new crown for the largest baby born in the history of the hospital.
“We knew he’d be bigger, but we didn’t expect this,” Terrica, a veteran mom with two sons and a daughter, shared in a statement to the hospital. “He’s already wearing three to six-month diapers and clothes. It feels like I skipped straight to having a 3-month-old.”
In a way she kind of did. The average size of a 3-month-old baby is 13 pounds, according to Medical News Today, and considering Shawn Jr. is a perfectly healthy and happy baby boy, he’s only going to get bigger as he grows up.
But Shawn Jr. isn’t even nearly as large as the biggest baby ever born. Giantess Anna Bates, who stood over 7 feet tall, gave birth to a baby boy who weighed 22 pounds and measured 28 inches long at her home in Seville, Ohio, on January 19, 1879. Shawn Jr. was shy of his size by a whole nine pounds, and still that is pretty remarkable.
On the other side of the spectrum, Chloe and Victor’s baby girl is much smaller than the average 7-pound newborn. “It was really charming and such a good reminder that babies come in all shapes and sizes,” Chloe shared in a statement to the hospital per People about her 4-pound little girl. “I’m feeling great and so thankful for the care we received from the doctors, nurses, and midwives.”
“These two births are a wonderful reminder that every baby and every birth story is unique,” noted Robyn Torgalski, system director of maternal child health at Centralus Health. “Whether a newborn weighs 4 pounds or 13, our teams are prepared to provide the highest level of care to both baby and family…We’re proud of the exceptional maternity care delivered at Cayuga Health, one of our valued affiliates, and honored to support families through moments like these.”
