'Life has started' for formerly conjoined twins from Co Antrim who are now at home after undergoing separation surgery.
Annabelle and Isabelle Bateson were attached from the chest to the pelvis and shared a bladder, bowel and a fused leg - but had separate hearts.
Parents Hannah and Dan Bateson, from Toomebridge, appeared on This Morning on Wednesday with their daughters.
Read more: NI parents share photo of formerly conjoined twins after successful surgery
The girls were born in March, were separated in September and got home from hospital last week.
Consultant Paediatric Surgeon Professor Paolo De Coppi from Great Ormond Street Hospital performed the separation surgery which is said to have taken 18 hours, with 30 people involved.
Speaking on This Morning, mum Hannah said: "Awk, I don't think there's words to quite sum it all up. We feel like life's sort of started now. We'd been in limbo for so long waiting for the surgery to happen and now that possibly the hardest time of our lives hopefully is over and done with, we can sort of start living now and get back to - well - what's going to be our normal I suppose."
Speaking about the day of the surgery, she added: "The longest day of our lives I think is the only way to describe it.
"We expected it to be long but quite how long? No.
"Even 18 hours sounds like such a long time but it felt like much, much longer."
Also speaking on the show, Professor Paolo De Coppi said: "They were lucky to have two separate hearts, two separate livers so we could separate them and it takes a huge team of people all looking after the different organs to be able to be safely separating them."
He added: "It takes a long time of preparation.
"Starting from the radiologists, getting the imaging right, getting all the details of the separation but you also have to be prepared to get surprises and get different aspects to what you planned before. You have to be prepared to go beyond that...
"There were a few surprises, but we were prepared for those as well."
Mum Hannah also spoke on how the girls, who have also had numerous other surgeries, are "finding their personalities again".
She said: "They are great. It's really took until the last few weeks for them really to get back to themselves. It was a long journey, we tried to prepare ourselves for- actually how difficult it would be - but we totally - there was no preparing for it.
"They're really finding their personalities again...
"Dan talks about their ignorance carrying them through, I say determination.
"They've had to be such strong characters to bring them through what they've been through. I just think there's no underestimating quite what they did go through.
"We sort of said, bar their head and their arms, every part of their body was operated on and for such tiny little girls, that's just unimaginable."
Dad Dan added: "Looking back on it, what they've been through and how they got through it and all, it's amazing."
This Morning airs weekdays from 10am on ITV1 and ITV Hub.
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