I must keep reminding myself that most people are, understandably, unfamiliar with emotionally laden twin dynamics. For obvious reasons, one would not know or be interested in these relationships unless he or she were a twin, were parenting twins, or were counseling twins. What seems obvious to me often results in an aha moment for those unfamiliar with the psychology of twins. I was telling my colleague about a twin patient of mine who struggles mightily with the challenge of defining […]
Tag Archives: emotional health
The Psychology of Twins—Who Knew?
I have just returned from a glorious two-week stay in Argentina. I will need to “detox” from all the delicious meat and fabuous red wine that I happily consumed during my time there. I gave a presentation to a wonderfully warm and engaging group of parents of multiples who appreciated hearing my particular views and philosophy about raising twins. Prior to my trip, I encountered incredulous responses to my telling people that I had been invited to give a presentation about […]
Can a Twin Connection Mask Emotional Vulnerability?
My London-based fellow “twin therapist” and I were discussing a case that she is treating at the moment. A family whose eighteen-year-old identical twin daughter withdrew from college at the beginning of her second term contacted my colleague for help. This exceptionally bright and accomplished young woman fell apart at college and was forced to take a medical leave of absence. It is difficult to speculate about the variables that may have contributed to this unsettling and unexpected chain of […]
Monkey Time: Alone Time at Its Best
I wanted to share one father’s enthusiastic endorsement of the benefits of alone time—time when one twin gets one-on-one parental attention. He shared his story with a group of parents I spoke to in San Francisco, prefacing his remarks by apologizing that he did not learn about one-on-one time from my book Emotionally Healthy Twins! He and his wife and their fraternal twin daughters coined the term “monkey time” to initiate time alone when the girls were toddlers. The father […]