What’s it like being a twin?

[crazychemist]

I’m expecting identical twins in Autumn. I don’t know any twins myself (aside from a pair that are 9 months old, so won’t be useful to ask!) and I wondered what it’s like being one?

If you were a twin, is there anything you would have liked your parents to do differently? Wondering if there are common parenting mistakes specific to twins.... obviously will try not to mix them up. I assume it’s annoying if you can’t tell who is who in a photo. Anything else I should think about in advance?

I don’t know what it’s like to be a twin as I’ve never not been a twin. I personally love it but know that’s not the same for everyone.

I have none identical twin boys, they say they don't know what it's like as they don't know any different! Do join TAMBA and be prepared for it to be expensive.

I'm a twin and we squabbled from an early age and now we only communicate 3 or 4 times a year by email and are superficially interested in each other's lives. I wish we hadn't been dressed identically. I wish we hadn't been given identical presents from EVERYONE so you knew what it was before you opened it. I wish our parents had done things with us as individuals and got to know our characters and what we liked. I wish we hadn't been continually compared with each other at school and sports (she came out worse and ended up semi dropping out as she 'wasn't the clever one'). My God, I hadn't realised what a minefield it was and how blooming miserable I was as a twin. I'm sure yours will be fine, parenting is different now (I'm nearly 70).

I always wanted to be a twin when I was younger, thought it looked so much fun! Can see how it could get annoying though being treated as one person as above.

I am a twin- a fraternal one. He is male and I am female. We used to be really close when we were younger, and I got roped in to a lot of stereotypically “boy” games when we were younger eg. playing Subbuteo or Football top trumps with him. As a result, I have an excellent knowledge of 1990s football despite zero interest now or then!

My mum was adamant we should be placed in separate classes in primary school so we would be treated separately and not as “the twins”. We then got streamed in to the same sets as we got older. So not sure if it worked that well. We ended up with quite classically stereotypically interests and talents as well: Him maths/ science, me arts/ humanities.

I can honestly say I have never felt competitive with him. At all. Academically or socially. We look very different also.

I am now closer to my older sister but when we were younger me and my brother were close, definitely. He is still more likely to speak to me than anyone else in my family (he is quite introverted).

The only time I felt it became a bit awkward was applying for universities. His course was not offered in very many places and he had a clear front runner. It was somewhere I also really wanted to go as well. I chose to make it my second choice but I thought I would
enjoy it there and easily could have put it as my first. I just felt we needed to have that independent experience and that uni meant more to him than me, plus my course was offered more widely.

As @Tulips2019 said I’ve never felt competitive with my sister. Disliked being called Twin 2 or Twinnies and found some people simply couldn’t be arsed to learn our names of how to tell us apart.

I do not know any different, but I am very grateful to my parents for treating us individually, and not consistently dressing us the same (though we had a few... Usually in different colours). We are quite close nowadays and meet most weeks. I would say the thing that annoyed me most is people who just considered us to be the twins and who bought us 1 present between us.

@lifestooshort123 that’s really helpful, there’s a few things there to avoid. Frankly, I’m dithering over whether to deliberately dress them in different colours when they’re tiny so we know who is who in photos later on - or would that be just as annoying as always being dressed the same. Presents sounds like a minefield - I can imagine them often getting the same thing from relatives, or just one present to “the twins”.... mind you, I’ll probably agonise over what if one gets the “better” present, so not sure that I have a solution to that!

@Howcanwehelp I’ve joined the twin trust (which I think has replaced tamba), and goodness do I know it’s going to be expensive! Double childcare costs is a bit of a nightmare....

@Tulips2019 what was it like being in the same classes at secondary school? Long way off for us, but I wonder if we should try and get them to a really big school so they are less likely to end up in the same sets (I’m a teacher, and my school is big enough that there are parallel sets, and they try to keep twins separate where possible if this is what the parents want).

@RosieLemonade being called twin 2 does sound annoying! We are going to stick to “the boys” (we already have a daughter) when we need to refer to them collectively rather than “the twins” and I hope this rubs off on family members.

My mum was adamant we should be placed in separate classes in primary school so we would be treated separately and not as “the twins”.

I knew of some twins who did that. One year on April Fools Day they swapped classes to see how long it would take the teachers to notice.

@crazychemist mine are oh 7.5 months so obv no comments from me but re clothes, we do tend to put one twin more in stripes than the other so we can tell them apart quickly and sue to his obsession in a certain show, ds has ascribed each twin a colour so of those colours are in the outfit choices they tend to get that colour. It feels a bit more subtle than a million photos of one anyways in green and one in yellow

My twins are 13, I asked at lots of parenting groups for twins, I asked adult twins I met in generally what shall I do/not do
..mine have very rarely dressed the same, were in separate classes from 8 on wards and are both wonderfully different personalities...like night and day..yet still strangely like 2 sides of the same person when they argue with each other. Both beautiful and clever both jealous of each other for very different reasons. Theres a minute between them, yet one looks and acts more like her brother, they are identical also😁it's hard, it's expensive, its relentless but it will make you a stronger, better person and it is so rewarding
Congratulations, mine both have a wonderful sense of humour. Had us in stitches as toddlers. They either love each other or hate each other like most siblings in my experience. Good luck with your journey
...

I'm an identical twin. I've always wondered what it's like to be a single. We were one of 5 sets of twins who started school together, but the only ones to be dressed differently and separated in primary school.
Did us the world of good as we made our own friends and became independent. I know one pair who do everything together, even work together! Despite being different, we were always treated as a unit at school and by strangers. It felt frustrating to be seen as not me if you see what I mean.
Having said that I haven't had anything to do with her for 6 years as she's an abusive narcissist. Which is sad, as we knew each other more than I've ever known anyone and always had an unspoken link.
Good luck xx

@SleepingStandingUp ahhhhh, that’s sneaky about the stripes! Might try that. I’d like to have a plan, as I’m really quite thoughtless about clothes and it has been pointed out that I’ve dressed my DD in the same colours as me a couple of times... it’s not deliberate at all, but I just grab things from the drawer without thinking about that sort of thing, so subconscious preferences do come out. I don’t want to accidentally make the twins match each other all the time!

@Fearofawelshplanet I’d love to join some multiples parenting groups so I could talk to people about these things in person. I’m really REALLY hoping that the local children’s centres will be open and running again by the time they arrive, but starting to feel less hopeful about that. Thank goodness for Mumsnet!

@EasyPeasyHappyCheesy one present between you does sound annoying. Don’t know how to avoid it though! Some relatives are bound to do this and I don’t feel comfortable making conditions for presents

With presents, the one between 2 is only if its something big (like a switch or a laptop). Every thing else we bought 2 of, but did different colours. So they have the sake mobile phone but one black and one white. Same but different was the motto. Also it helps if they like a thing regarding clothes. So one was always superman/captain America. The other one spiderman/iron man. From the age of 6 they sorted out their own clothes from a pile as I couldn't remember who had which pants and socks. Plain grey school socks were shared. Their heading into secondary in September and I've put them in different schools so they will be indervidual children.

when we need to refer to them collectively rather than “the twins” and I hope this rubs off on family members. I have twins , they refer to themselves as “we are twins” they also insist on dressing the same other than their underwear where they have their own characters. They have bunk beds but share the top bunk so they don’t “ feel lonely”

@TaighNamGastaOrt

I'm an identical twin. I've always wondered what it's like to be a single. We were one of 5 sets of twins who started school together, but the only ones to be dressed differently and separated in primary school. Did us the world of good as we made our own friends and became independent. I know one pair who do everything together, even work together! Despite being different, we were always treated as a unit at school and by strangers. It felt frustrating to be seen as not me if you see what I mean. Having said that I haven't had anything to do with her for 6 years as she's an abusive narcissist. Which is sad, as we knew each other more than I've ever known anyone and always had an unspoken link. Good luck xx

5 sets in one intake?! What was in the water in your town?!

Im an identical twin and am very close to my sister although we haven't lived near each other for 30 years.
we were in different classes in school whjch was the right thing for us, and although mum tried to dress us the same, we hated it!
Now we often find we have independently bought the same clothes
we also slept in the same bed by choice quite often as children - we shared a room.
Definitely swapped places ofter too - grnerally git away with it, got a detention at senior school as ny twin was sick and her teacher saw me in the lunch que!! Very early in the term and he didn't believe I wasnt her.
avoid presents for both, lots of individual stuff - we had separate hobbies ie horse riding for me and ballet for my twin.
Also allow them to have separate friends - and make sure friends parents know both don't have to be invited to parties or play dates - It's good to encourage independance.
And finally there were 5 sets of tqins in my school year too - and 3 sets had 1 girl with the same common name...

I'm not a twin and my siblings are not even particularly close in age, but my mum used to regularly refer to us as "you three" until I told her how much I disliked it.

@Mrsemcgregor run off from strange goings on at the local military base which resulted in multiple births! I do recall we were the only pair separated and mum was accused of cruelty for it!!
I find we buy dad the same cards etc and have met her in shops before buying the same items!
The present to be shared! I hated that! Either that or two identical present in different colours! I appreciate it must be hard to be fair when buying for twins tho! 😁

I’m a twin, I adore it. I love my sister to bits, honestly my best friend, speak to her multiple times a day and she’s the one I turn to when things go wrong.
But it hasn’t always been a bed of roses, we were so competitive and for me that led to obsessive perfectionism. I ended up with severe anorexia. I really don’t think that was due to anything my parents did, it was just the way I was.
But despite that I’m so so glad I’m a twin. I can’t imagine my life without her.

My DS started school with three pairs of identical twin boys in his class. I kid you not.

One mum kept them completely the same every hour of every day. Thankfully for DS, one had a freckle to identify him by.

The other two pairs - one mum got them pin badges with their initial on so people could tell them apart and the third mum ironed their name tapes on the outside of their shirt collar.

DS could play independently with each boy and knew who he was playing with.

I work in a school. Twin boys whom nobody can tell apart so they always get called twin. Or Erm until they tell you who they are. As a non twin family, I would find that so annoying if no-one ever knew my name. Why is it acceptable for a twin.

My point is if you want other people to identify them separately confidently, make it bleeding obvious.

I'm not a twin, but my best friends all through secondary school were twins. They were (and still are) very close. They shared a bedroom, clothes, underwear (their elder sister shared pants too, just one massive drawer of them, I found that weird but I have a brother so never shared clothes). They were completely different personalities. Even though they were identical, I found it easy to tell them apart. We're still friends now and my DH doesn't believe me that they're identical as they are so different in every other way so he can easily tell them apart.

They disliked being known as 'Twin'. As PP have said, some people didn't even bother learning their names. They dressed differently as much as possible, though school made that tricky, so one chopped her long hair really short. They and their sister had allocated colours as children, for towels, water bottles etc. Never bothered them, and it ticked over into the teen years. They were in separate classes initially, but in secondary school ended up in many of the same. Some classes I'd have with one sister, others I'd have with the other.

I also nannied identical toddler twins. Parents keen to treat them as individuals. I did like dressing them in coordinating outfits though. Think the same plain t-shirt in two colour. But put one in dungarees with it and the other in shorts. Despite being identical genetically, one was stockier than the other and never looked quite right in dungarees, whereas his brother rocked them. You might find that with your boys, one simply might not suit something. My children (not twins) had similar with dungarees. DS1 just didn't suit them. DS2 looked awesome in them.

I know people with multiples that lay them on a particular side for pictures, usually in birth order so you can tell who's who.

Fascinating thread though. Thank you.

I’m a fraternal twin.

It’s good. We get on, sometimes we don’t.

I suppose it’s just like having a sister/brother, only difference being is that you’ve been together from
the start.

I don’t think my mom did much with regards to us being twins. We did get the same clothes, but I don’t think we thought too much of it. It was just how it was. (:

Friends who have identical twins admit that they did mix them up several times when they were babies. At a certain point they just went “ok, this one is A and this one is B” and then put little baby bracelets with their names on them. But really they don’t know which was originally named A or was eldest.

So I guess maybe keep the hospital baby bracelets on until you can get something to put on them!

@RemyHadley

Friends who have identical twins admit that they did mix them up several times when they were babies. At a certain point they just went “ok, this one is A and this one is B” and then put little baby bracelets with their names on them. But really they don’t know which was originally named A or was eldest.

So I guess maybe keep the hospital baby bracelets on until you can get something to put on them!

I have ALWAYS wondered about this. If it actually could happen.