Throughout our lives it is meaningful to have others who believe in us. Attuned and loving parents habitually play this role as their child develops and matures. Other mentors may present themselves in the role of teacher, coach, grandparent, psychotherapist, or caretaker—each capable of playing a vital function in a child’s growth. Some twin pairs will not have this experience. If the parents have not worked at making an attachment to each sibling rather than to the pair, the twins […]

The following two paragraphs are paraphrased portions of a session that I had with an adolescent identical twin who lives overseas. Her feelings and experiences typify developmental concerns and feelings about teenage twinships. “I am afraid to tell my sister to leave me alone. She’ll be mad at me. I don’t want to hurt her feelings. Her being away last summer was so fantastic. I did not have her looking over my shoulder, invading and intruding upon me and my […]

Many psychotherapists concur that exceptional work can be accomplished when a patient reaches out for help during a critical phase. My patient “Sheila” telephoned me in a distraught state, saying that her twenty-one-year-old fraternal twin sons had just informed her that they recently got the same tattoo to celebrate their twin bond. Of course, people have varied opinions about their children becoming tattooed, and Sheila had profound judgmental feelings about this sort of thing. She explained that she had very […]

Many twins who reach out to me for guidance struggle with anxiety about not feeling self-reliant. They realize that this conundrum relates significantly to growing up with a twin whom they relied upon to feel secure, soothed, loved, and protected. Most have an intellectual understanding about these circumstances. They realize that their twin attachment constitutes their primary emotional security throughout their lives. Yet if one twin decides to form relationships outside the twinship and no longer feels invested in his […]

My first job after I received my social work license involved working with children and their families in a medical setting. I was in my twenties, single, and inexperienced. My first psychoanalytical training program included a child-centered curriculum that involved working closely with children and their parents along with mastering countless readings about child development theories and approaches. What has stayed most poignantly with me is not the various and sundry pieces of parenting advice, which ebb and flow throughout […]