If more people understood the complicated dynamics between identical twin girls, the public might be less inclined to treat them as a unit and lump them together. When I work with adult female MZ (monozygotic, or identical) twins, I am amazed and dismayed at their underdeveloped and unsophisticated knowledge of themselves and one another. Since they have had few opportunities to be separate and have primarily shared a peer group, they are shockingly unaware of their personality differences until an external event […]
Category Archives: Conflict
Don’t Date My Sister
A mom of eighteen-year-old twins asked me to help her understand why her son adamantly denied his sister permission to date his friends. Both attend separate schools and thus have different social groups. While I did not know all of the particular details, I shared some ideas about why her son might be feeling this way. Since most adolescents are very wary of parental scrutiny and intrusiveness, perhaps this young man did not feel comfortable allowing his sister into his […]
Twins Sharing Friends
A mom in the audience at the Multiple Births Canada Conference asked me my thoughts about her eight-year-old identical twin daughters sharing a friend. She related that this triadic relationship has been strong for a number of years. The mother’s efforts to arrange separate play dates for each girl have yielded minimal results. Another mom of six-year-old identical twin girls describes similar circumstances. She contends that her daughters have made friends with one powerful girl who directs their play. Both […]
If She Cries, I Cry
I am always moved to tears when I witness adult twins who can empathize so intensely with each other. They can be in the middle of a contentious interaction when one of them suddenly becomes teary-eyed and upset. Instantaneously, the conflict recedes and empathic resonance sets in. No words are spoken; a nonverbal behavioral change records the vulnerability and redirects the emotionality. Perhaps this intrinsic fine-tuning is the adult version of childhood twin behavior—fighting like cats and dogs over everything […]
Love Me, Love Me Not
A mother of 15-year-old fraternal twin girls came to see me because she was concerned that the verbal and physical fighting between her daughters had escalated to a frightening degree. She told me that Elsa and Avery have always been close. She described Elsa as the easygoing twin who has habitually complied with and tolerated the overbearing behavior of her sister, Avery. But the girls’ attitudes and roles have shifted within the last few months. Avery has become increasingly […]