Everyone knows that boy/girl twins can’t identical right? Wrong!

[Tincytot]

Here is my Friday night rant as a mum of twins teenagers who still gets asked if they are identical when the girl/boy twins are standing right in front of them, looking not one bit alike let alone identical. Plus they’re different sexes!

typical conversation-
“oh you have twins, what are they?”
”a boy and a girl”
“lovely, are they identical?”
”no they’re a boy and a girl”
”yeah but are they identical?”

🙄🙄

I also have boy & girl twins , now 24 .
I was asked this constantly by people !!!

People who don’t have twins tend to be rather under informed.
My identical girls are 34 now but I used to get so many questions.
They usually wore their own colours (never identically dressed but think one in red/blue/yellow and one in purple/green/pink for eg) as it was easier for us. .. one had a red painted toenail when they were tiny 😆
Conversations tended to go.. oh a boy and a girl, are they identical? No, two girls but a boy and girl can’t be identical… why not?
And for a poster above, identical - monozygotic - twins can share one amniotic sac or have one each. As can fraternal - dizygotic - twins, it all depends upon when the eggs split and/or how they implant in the uterus.

Comedian Steven K Amos has a twin sister when asked if they are identical he simple says no he has a penis

Sometimes I answer (when asked this Q re my M/F twins) 'no. One of them has a willy'.

A friend had identical twins from ivf. She describes it as the ultimate BOGOF deal.

Well they won't have identical penises. Or identical breasts. Or identical testes. Or identical ovaries. Or identical uteruses.

Aargh. Posted too soon. Or identical beards. What have I missed?

You think the concept of "identical" in relation to literally anything is not encountered in schools??! How on God's green Earth can a person with tits be identical to a person with a willy?

I think it’s a bit pedantic to have an issue with this.. obviously they know they are different sexes. They are asking if they are twins who look alike or ones who look different.

Oh god. How did i forget.... brain fog!! Or identical vaginas. Or identical Y chromosomes. Or hip width. Or shoulder width. Or pitch of voice. Or hormones. Or body hair. Unlikely to even be the same height. Anyway, thats enough internet for today.

I used to get that with my boy and girl twins.
My answer used to be
“ No they are just a brother and sister who happened to be born on the same day “

My boy is 2.5 years younger than his sister but was always big for his age. People always asked if they were twins. Once when she was in school uniform (age 4) and he was 2!

This!

Identical genes

@Health47 Boy Girl twins can’t have identical genes. One is XX & other is XY chromosomes. They are no more closely related to each other than any other siblings. They just shared a (divided) room for 9 months and have the same birthday.

Good heavens! You surely knew the difference between boys and girls before you were 30? 😂

No they cannot be identical, they can look very alike as siblings can but cannot be identical as that would mean having virtually identical dna and therefore being same sex

No their DNA is the same.

One theory is that the 'normal' identical twins are formed by a zygote splitting in two but mirror image twins separate at a later stage.

It's facinating.

I watched this a while back A mother conceived identical quads who when this was filmed were starting primary school.

@Health47 and that chromosome error renders them no longer identical. They may have most of their genes in common, but they’re not identical any more.

But twins that are the “look alike” type are identical twins - from one egg. Which boy/girl cannot be (yes yes excluding the exceptionally rare disorders). The types of twins that don’t look alike are non identical. So asking if they are identical is asking if they are the type of twin that is identical from one egg surely? If you met someone with 2 children (boy and girl) who were not the same age you wouldn’t ask them if they were identical would you? Because you know they can’t be. Despite the fact some siblings can look very very similar. So you wouldn’t ask whether they are the type of siblings who look alike or the type that don’t surely?
Two children born at different times were two eggs fertilised at different times. In 99.9% of cases boy/girl twins are two eggs that fertilised at the same time but still genetically just as different as siblings born at different times. They are no more alike than any other siblings. They just happened to be born at the same time. Sometimes siblings will look alike. Sometimes they look nothing like each other. Only twins born from one egg splitting will be actually identical - which is what people are asking. (Again, yes this is a basic explanation with some very rare exceptions).

I too have twins, boy/girl. What is even more worrying, I have had 3 nurses ask me if they are identical!!!!!

You have to feel a little sorry for some people who were at the back of the queue when brain cells were handed out!

50% of people are of less than average intelligence.

I just think people don't always listen, or our brains skip to a standard question. I always ask for black coffee and I guarantee that the next question is almost always - Do you want milk with that?

I had this when my b/g twins were born. Amazes me how dense some people are