Dion's baby has 'twin'

Dion fell in love with husband Angelil when she was 16

The Canadian singer Celine Dion has said she has a frozen embryo "twin" of her unborn child with which she hopes to become pregnant in the future.

Her first child, due in February, will be a boy.

The embryo "twin" is frozen at the New York clinic where she and her 58-year-old husband, Rene Angelil, had in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment.

We already have another child waiting for us

Celine Dion

The 32-year-old performer of hits like My Heart Will Go On, from the film Titanic, said: "I have a twin. It is called a laboratory twin.

"I do not know if it is good forever but I think it lasts for a very long time. I will go get it, that's for sure. I told my mother.

"I surely couldn't live knowing that child is there."

Dion made the revelations in a Canadian television interview on Sunday.

She spoke candidly about all aspects of the treatment and her pregnancy.

Freezing embryos in this way gives a couple another chance to conceive without enduring the complicated egg retrieval process again.

Dion found showbusiness a strain

In this case the embryo was frozen within days of conception.

According to the Human Fertility and Embryology Authority (HFEA) this is a routine proceedure in IVF.

But should Dion become pregnant with the frozen embryo, the resulting child would not be an identical twin of the baby due in February.

A spokeswoman for the HFEA said: "They will be no closer genetically than normal siblings, in the same way as non-identical twins are not the same genetically."

This is because the embryos would have been conceived using separate eggs and sperms.

Dion and Angelil, whose throat cancer is in remission, have been trying to conceive for some time.

This was her first interview since she took a career break in order to have a child and spend time with her husband.

The couple married in 1994 but Angelil has managed Dion's career since she began singing as a teenager.

Though the singer does not rule out returning to pop music in the future she said she does not miss the hectic show-business lifestyle.

She said "I was a real robot, I was at the end of my rope."