Twins who do not get along with their sibling definitely feel a sense of loss. Although the rupture most likely begins with anger and resentment, the ultimate split results in a distressing emotional upheaval. While this estrangement is not tantamount to the death of one’s twin, the split can nonetheless intensify painful feelings of grief and regret. Acknowledging that one’s twin connection is no longer special or comforting is heartbreaking. In fact, some twins feel tremendous shame over the split. […]
Category Archives: Loss
Multiples Unmasking Medical Mysteries
International Multiple Birth Awareness Week will be celebrated November 5–12 in 2018. ICOMBO (the International Council of Multiple Birth Organisations) highlights a theme each year to promote awareness of the unique needs of infant, child, and adult multiples. This year, ICOMBO’s message focuses on the enormous contribution that research with multiples makes to the understanding of genetic and epigenetic conditions. I am pleased to be a member of ICOMBO and to support their ongoing agenda. When I first read about […]
Twin Loss: An Epigenetic Accident
A woman in her early twenties (I’ll call her Cathy) wrote me a beautiful email asking for advice about how to deal with the “loss” of her twin. She explained that she had read my book The Same but Different and found it helpful in many ways; however, her circumstances were such that my book could not offer her the specific help she needed. She hoped I would be able to provide additional resources for her after I learned more […]
The Vicissitudes of Twin Loss
In the last few months, I have been working with two grieving families. In both instances, a fraternal twin died owing to accidental circumstances—a drug overdose and an automobile collision. The man was in his late thirties and the young woman in her late twenties. While my heart goes out to those who have lost a loved one, I am inclined to be most concerned about the surviving twins and their well-being. In both cases, the surviving twin was the […]
Thoughts about Dr. Phil’s Program “Identical Twins Starving to Death: Who’s to Blame?”
Recently, Dr. Phil featured a program about sixteen-year-old twins, Taylor and Tricia, who both have an eating disorder. It was tragic to witness how these girls’ lives have been swallowed up in an anorexic bulimic vortex. The visual images of their binging and purging behavior were graphically stunning. While we certainly cannot know all of the circumstances that contributed to the girls’ eating disorder, the producers of this program focused on the parents’ divorce, the mother’s boyfriend, and the father’s […]