Together again: Vince (left) holding Daevyn, with her fiance Matthew @ Tinesh Kumar, daughter Demetria and her mother Selvi Gabriel (seated) with Daelan on her lap.
PETALING JAYA: After years marked by separation and struggle, Deborah Anne Vince will finally get to celebrate Christmas with her three children again.
“We were broken in many ways. But now, we’re finding our way back to each other,” she said.
She is the mother of conjoined twins who made national news in March 2022 after they were successfully separated in a landmark operation carried out at Hospital Tunku Azizah in Kuala Lumpur.
The boys, who were just 17 days old at the time, were the youngest conjoined twins ever in Malaysia to undergo such surgery.
But the journey has not been smooth for Vince since then.
A year after the twins’ birth, her eight-year marriage ended. She was left to navigate motherhood alone, caring for her eldest daughter Demetria, now 10, and the twin boys Daelan and Daevyn.
Daevyn has severe cerebral palsy and requires constant supervision.
Vince, 33, said she eventually moved from Taiping to Johor to work as an administrative assistant at a special needs daycare centre.
Her children live in Taiping with her mother.
The separation, she said, was not by choice but a necessity.
“I was overwhelmed. I was just trying to survive,” said Vince.
During that period, her mother and elder sister became the backbone of the family.
Vince said her sister took on the responsibility of caring for her son Daevyn, who has cerebral palsy and is bedridden.
“I’m very blessed. Without my my mum and my elder sister, I wouldn’t have made it,” she said.
But the emotional cost was heavy. Vince missed her children deeply, often breaking down in tears after long days at work.
In an unforeseen turn, she found love again in late 2023.
Although her family was initially hesitant and protective of her after everything she had endured, Vince’s fiance soon proved his commitment in ways she never expected.
At one point, she said her fiance even took over caring for Daevyn.
“He never left me, no matter the situation. I thank God for him,” she said.
Slowly, the family began to get back together.
Both twins now live full-time with Vince. Demetria will also come to live with them after the Christmas holiday is over.
Daelan is a lively child, both at home and in school.
“When I ask him if he wants to go back to the babysitter, he says, ‘No, mummy, I want you.’ That makes me so happy,” said Vince.
Life has not been within its recent challenges. Both boys recently recovered from chickenpox. Daelan also requires urgent surgery for a hernia while Daevyn has one, too, though less severe.
Despite the demands of daily life, Vince said she can finally look ahead with hope.
(A previous news report in 2022 quoted her as saying that the twins were named Daelan Hope Marshall and Daevyn Hope Marshall because she prayed that God would save her children.)
This Christmas, Vince said, the family will travel back to Taiping together.
It will be the first time in years that she will be celebrating the festive season with her complete family.
“When Daelan sees my fiance treating me right, he smiles and says, ‘Mummy, daddy, Daelan, akka and Daevyn. That’s him saying we are a family again,” she said.
