Amusingly, many of the twins who patiently answered the survey questions at my booth at the Twins Day Festival displayed a penchant for peeking at their twin’s paper to check out his or her answers. Most had no idea what they were doing until I laughingly pointed it out. Twins just do those kinds of things habitually—without thinking. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I was heartened to find out how consistent the survey findings were with the material […]
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A Room of Her Own
A mother of six-year-old identical twins shared a lovely story that illustrates how natural it can be to attend to each twin’s needs when guilt feelings don’t get in the way. Mother explained that her daughter Sandy talked about wanting to have her own room. Two issues had to be managed. The first was that this sentiment hurt her other daughter, Anna. Anna told her mom that Sandy’s wish to be on her own hurt her feelings. The second issue […]
Best Friends . . . Bah, Humbug!
News about the healthy birth of monoamniotic (sharing the same amniotic sac) twin girls in Ohio in May went viral for a number of reasons. First, these births are rare (one in every 10,000 births) and often pose significant health risks to the unborn twins. The fetuses share a placenta and an amniotic sac but have separate umbilical cords. If unmonitored, strangulation might happen. Naturally everyone was relieved and pleased about the positive outcome. However, most people seemed to be […]
Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors
I had the pleasure of attending a wonderful production of The Comedy of Errors a few weeks ago at the Blackfriars Playhouse in Staunton, Virginia. Both Twelfth Night and The Comedy of Errors are Shakespearean comedies in which themes about twins shape the plot, the characters, and the antics of the plays. The Comedy of Errors, one of Shakespeare’s earliest plays, involves identical twin men who were separated at birth. When one twin unknowingly arrives in the town where his […]
Missing Out on the Good Times
During one of my recent talks to a Moms of Multiples group, I asked the audience to help me understand why organizing alone time with each twin can be an emotional hurdle. One woman related that alone time with each twin interferes with family time, especially during the weekends when full-time working parents can spend time together with their children. Another woman shared her concerns in a delightfully humorous way. She explained that her well-intentioned, engineer-minded husband was not the […]