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?

Interesting thread. I'm a girl from a girl/boy "twinship" ! So probably quite different to being an identical twin! However, I like being a twin, it's all I've known! Always a playmate, unlike older sister and brother who were off to high school, uni, etc. Some of our clothes matched as in same jogging suit but one pink and one blue (80's!) I don't think it bothered me as it stopped once we were over say 7/8? We were in P1 and P7 together but I think after that we were separate most of primary and then only together in 5th year (Scotland) ....prefered not being in classroom with him! In P7 (we were 11) teacher asked "Do you ever go shopping and buy the same dress?" .....eh no! Poor brother had a lot of jokes that day! You will be so busy with twins make sure your way of identifying them in photo is easy.....after one baby has needed a change of clothes for the 3rd time that day you might start to struggle! I didn't mind being labeled the "twins" and I don't think we had to share gifts that I remember....although having an annoying brother open his xmas gifts early in your room when a lot were similar was annoying! I think just be open minded, your twins may naturally want to be a "pair" and be together a lot or they may be more independent, so just let them grow and see how they are! Exciting! I would love Twins although I'm sure it would be hard work! Good luck! We came slightly early, 5 mins apart and BF easily from the start! Wishing you easy happy twins! :-)

@TaighNamGastaOrt that’s fascinating!

Well my twin sisaters look alike and are very similar and were very close growing up, but live in different towns so don,t see each other much more often then I see them.
My mum looks very different from her twin but was very close well into their twenties, travelling with her.
My mil does not get on with her twin, very different people looks wise and personality wise. So every one is different.

Being a twin is great. Don't try and force them apart to make them be individuals at every step of the way, but give them the space to do things individually if they w as nt to. Spend time with them one on one as they get older so they're not "the twins" they're 2 separate children. Don't get them cards "to the twins" and try to avoid allowing others to do it. Big presents that are shared are fine but shop for the children as individuals too. We had some gift givers who would buy the same thing in different colours and just chuck us a package each - it used to happen a surprising amount!

My friend has identical girls. They always put them on the same side of the double buggy, same high chair. Twin a always on the left.

Probably so they didnt have to adjust straps every time as one was 3 lbs, the other 5.
A different friend had twin boys. Identical again. She never dressed them the same. And she snuck a post it on the back of both their tops, so she knew who was who. Whenever anybody visited, the first thing she said was "hello, how are you? A is in red, B is in green"
When they started in the local single intake primary, obviously they were in uniform. A always wore proper grey school socks. B always wore his own "home" socks in bright colours and never matching. That was the only way to tell them apart at school!

I'm an identical twin. We fought like cat and dog -mainly because I was bossy-. We are very close now we've grown up but my twin is sometimes still dependent on me and I feel under pressure at times to be the sorter outer.
My advice is treat them as individuals. Dress them differently. Encourage them to have their own friends and hobbies.
Don't put them in boxes based on their personality, ie this is x they are the talkative/outgoing/kind one and this is y they are creative/sporty/quiet.

@Nothingoriginalhere, that’s a good point about play dates. I hadn’t thought about that yet as my DD is only 3, so in all honesty play dates are more about my friends than hers! And anyone with more than one kid brings all of them. But I can see that mums would feel under pressure to invite both.

@AtleastitsnotMonday sorry to hear that you struggled. I can imagine it must get competitive quite easily , I think it’s tricky enough with any sibling to avoid comparing yourself.

@chuffedasbuttons good point. Something to identify them at school sounds like a good idea. I suppose if they were girls I’d go for different coloured hair ties, I’ll have to think of something for boys.... pin badges sounds like a possibility, thank you. At DDs preschool, they have badges for their house (even though there is only one preschool class), so if they go to the same place it should be easy enough if they are different houses (unlesss I continually lose the bloody thing as I do with DD.... must remember to take it out before washing jumper!!!)

@TeetotalKoala some good ideas there, thank you. I guess if they have a predominant colour that can be applied to toys, pencil cases.... all sorts of things as they get older. Hopefully they’ll have different favourite colours, that would make it easy.

@Bodgedboxdye thanks for the info. I don’t mind the boys sharing clothes (certainly at the start I don’t imagine I’ll both having vests for twin 1 and vests for twin 2 etc) but as they’re going to be identical I don’t want to dress them alike too much in case they get mixed up all the time. It’s nice to hear you have a typical sibling relationship.

@RemyHadley we are planning on a bit of discrete toe nail varnish until we find some distinguishing features to tell them apart

@spotlovesbedtime very good point about the potential need to do lots of changes.... I definitely had days with DD when she got through 4 changes of clothes, so I suppose that might be challenging if I’m trying to maintain some kind of scheme to tell them apart! Fingers crossed mine are easy when they come, I have to admit to being a bit anxious about how the first 6 months will go what with juggling a very active 4 year old who is used to having my full attention at home.

@Yaottie presents seem likely to be a minefield! Bit worried that it’s a bit out of my control what relatives give, so could be tricky to manage. Definitely want to give them their own space/time as they get older, although it does sound tricky. It had been my aim to stop at 2 children because I didn’t see how I’d be able to give them enough “one on one time”.... fate had other plans!

@MyNameHasBeenTaken I had been thinking about socks for school! Alas DDs school is strict on uniform and there’s only one acceptable colour of sock, otherwise I was planning on having them always in different socks for the sake of the teacher. Maybe they’ll make an exception!

@Tomorrowsanewday good point about not putting them in boxes. I suppose that can happen very easy, as if you’re looking for ways to distinguish between them it’s easy to latch onto minor differences and exaggerate them. I’ll try to watch out for that and stop myself if I think it’s happening. The thought of them fighting like cat and dog is a terrifying one , don’t know how I’d cope! It’s been so calm only have one child so far!

I’m not a twin but my sister and I are very close in age
We were dressed exactly the same
Given the same stuff etc
Treated as twins because mum wanted twins desperately
Sister hated it - She still gets annoyed about it

Op I’d say don’t forget these are two individuals who just happen to have been born on the same day
Give them seperate clothes and toys Get to know each one as an seperate person
They aren’t one person in two bodies

@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!

Mother of twins here. When you get them home from hospital, paint the big toenails of one of them before you take the hospital tags off! Mind you, mine were mixed up once that I know of. We'd got up to feed them, once they'd finished we put them back in their cots. It was the middle of the night, it was dark and i didn't have my glasses on, and I put the baby I had back in the empty cot. (Husband had already put one of them back but in the wrong cot) I got one of them up in the morning, fed her, got her washed and dressed and it wasn't until I'd started on the other one I realized they were the wrong way round. Whoops! Also, if one wakes up for a feed, wake the other one up and feed them as well, otherwise you'll never get any sleep.

“We are very close now we've grown up but my twin is sometimes still dependent on me and I feel under pressure at times to be the sorter outer”

This forever. It’s very hard your life being so intwined with someone else’s and not being able to fix all their problems.

The world's most identical twins share a bf and intent to use ivf to get pregnant at exactly the same time!!
News article this week I read!!

Don't call them "the boys". It's no different to "the twins" . Unless you intend to call your daughter "the girl"!

one was 3 lbs, the other 5.

My colleague has twins and at birth one was 6lbs and the other was 10lbs.

Ouch

I used to put different coloured hair ribbons in the girls hair when they were at school. I did want to put name badges on them but the teacher thought it would single them out as being different. Yes it would, because there were 2 of them who looked the same!
Funnily enough, more times than i can remember, they've got ready separately to go out and have both put on the same thing. I used to dress them in similar clothes but different colours when they were younger.

I'm an identical twin. I hated being dressed the same and being called
One of the Twins! A real pet hate.
I love being a twin. I have a brilliant relationship with my sister and couldn't be without her. I feel very lucky.

I'm an identical twin (nc for this thread!) I have always been really close to my Dsis. My parents asked for us to be in different classes from year 2 but actually we just met at break times and didnt make friends independently. When we were ability streamed at high school we were back in the same class and very competitive
My parents always encouraged us to dress differently and sometimes we had the same thing in different colours but probably from the age of 10 we had our own style.
We're still very competitive now!!
And we did swap classes on April fools day once and the teachers never knew. We told them afterwards and one of them gave us some house points for it!

My DTs are 7 in a month. Very very different in looks - they were 5lb5 and 7lb13 at birth and that gap has continued. One is blonde, one brunette. The little one is older which she loves telling people. People have asked me if I'm sure they're twins.

They're in one form entry so are in the same class but they have different strengths and different friends, so we've done the single play dates too.

I struggle most with their birthday and trying to find a mid point in plans. More than happy for them to have their own parties but the day itself is a bit fraught. We always sing happy birthday twice so they each get their own go. Only DH's sister gives them a card between them. We also give them big joint presents but that's normally at Christmas. They love being twins at birthdays and Christmas because they say they get twice as many presents because really they get to play with them all.

They've shared rooms and not shared rooms. We have bunk beds in one bedroom so they're in their together at the moment but it was important to me that they had their own personal space so they do have their own rooms as somewhere to go with their own things in.

I answer to either my own name or my sisters name but one thing that really irritated was people who knew us for years but were too lazy to try and remember who was who. From mid teens we had quite different hairstyles but there were people who had known us for 10 years + that kept saying , which one are you, again?

My twins are boy/girl and our school purposely splits them up, as no matter how much you want to talk about Bob you always insert frank into the chat. It's very true ime, I'm very guilty of it. They ARE two very different people. Mine absolutely adore each other much more than the older dds (22month difference)of, they seem to be very much a team, though there's very clear differences.

People have asked me if I'm sure they're twins. Yeah cos you'd totally not notice if they came out of your body within a few minutes of each other or a year apart 😂

I don’t mind the boys sharing clothes (certainly at the start I don’t imagine I’ll both having vests for twin 1 and vests for twin 2 etc) but as they’re going to be identical I don’t want to dress them alike too much in case they get mixed up all the time we do this, and will do so until one of them objects frankly. But weirdly they still have the odd thing of "theirs". Like dragon vests, I know which dragon belongs to which child and would tell DH off if he got them wrong. If I pick up two outfits, one anyways gets the lighter colour and one the darker, and I've already mentioned about the stripes. It's funny what you'll do almost without realising it if you're getting to differentiate not keep them identical.
Matching just seems like such hard work when kids go through clothes so much

I'm a twin fraternal girl /boy, growing up we always had each other to play with and were very close. I hated being referred to as The twins, even by my father who was also a twin (several sets of twins in my family). We had to share a card and presents on birthdays, and were very envious when our older sister got a present all to herself. We don't see much of each other these days as we live at opposite ends of the country but I love him to bits. Family used to say I was the dominant twin, not sure if I was or not.

I've got 13 year old identical twins. They are close but independent.

I dressed them the same or coordinating usually. Simply because I couldn't bear to put one girl in an outfit that I thought was better than an other.

They decided to colour code themselves around 3. They did used to get upset at people not knowing who they were. I think it was them not understanding that they look the same. They looked at a photo of themselves and couldn't tell who was who and I think then the penny dropped as we didn't have problems after that.

Photos I would label by initial left to right. Eg March 2020 ab - twin a on left, twin b on right.

Present wise I give the same thing to all my girls after a disastrous Christmas where I gave different things according to their interests and I had a mass meltdown on my hands.

For Christmas I sort presents into bundles so everyone is opening the same thing at once and if there are different presents it's obvious that it's even. That means everyone gets a surprise.

My two never had problems with combined presents as they are usually something that they can both do together.

School wise it's usually pretty apparent who needs to be separated and who should stay together.

Good luck - twins are an amazing experience!

@crazychemist I completely agree with @lifestooshort123.
As a twin myself, I feel like I had a lot of similar experiences.
I love my brother, but we certainly aren't close.
We didn't breathe separately from 0 to 13 years (home together, childminders together, same classes etc).
I'm more academic, my brother more practically minded and outdoorsy. I felt like I never had praise for academic achievements as my parents didn't want to make my brother feel bad.
Same birthday presents, joint parties obviously, same xmas presents (even if we wanted different things).
I didn't actually feel like an individual till I left home at 20 and moved 300 miles away!

I'm sure some people love being treated identically, but I would make sure they know they are individuals too.

I'm (very early) pregnant now and I'm actually quite stressed at the thought of having twins. It's really put me off!!!!