Our parenting roles with our adult children and their families can at times be complicated and conflictual. The ever-present vestiges of sibling rivalry live long in most of us. Often I talk with my therapist about ongoing issues with my five children. She smiles sympathetically and replies, “Joan, you have too many children.” Thankfully, my clinical training has prepared me well for my lifelong occupation as the resident complaint department. I have developed and refined the art of empathic listening […]
Tag Archives: independence
A Unique Look at the Twin Bond
This terrific piece popped up a few months ago in my Google Alerts page. The author is Isabel Sakarin, a lovely young woman who just finished her freshman year at Vassar College. With her permission, I am sharing this beautiful homage to her twinship. She and her twin brother, Ben, attend different colleges. This article integrates her love for her brother and for science. I trust you will be enlightened and entertained by Ms. Sakarin’s keen sense of humor and […]
Separate Classes, Different Lunch Boxes
Among the many interesting questions that were asked during my workshop and book presentation in Guatemala, there are a few that I’d like to write about in some detail. A mom of eight-year-old fraternal twin girls seemed puzzled by some behavior exhibited by her daughters. She explained how well each girl functions independently. They are in separate classes and have separate friends. So, when mom suggested that they each do a different afterschool activity, she was surprised by their reluctance […]
Without You, Who Am I?
Recently I have been troubled by the many calls I have received from twins having difficulty coping without their sibling. A while ago, a young man in his early thirties shared his twin dilemma. He poignantly related that he does not miss his brother in a physical sense because he lives just a few hours away; rather, he misses the way he feels about himself when his brother is around—calm, secure, and confident. This pair of identical twin men had […]
Flying Solo
I have had the privilege of helping a middle-aged twin woman (whom I shall refer to as M) reclaim her self following the sudden loss of her twin brother. When her brother died unexpectedly, her world fell apart. Both twins had been heavily emotionally dependent upon one another in a myriad of complex and complicated ways. At two years of age, their father took M and her brother away from their biological mother because she was too mentally unstable to […]