To never tell them their birth order?

[sunshinepoppy]

I have twin boys who were born by c-section. Over the years I have seen interviews with adult twins where they set great store by their birth order. E.g saying one should know better because they are elder by 5 mins. This type of dynamic seems odd and unhelpful.

For this reason we have decided not to tell the boys their birth order. I am now starting to doubt this decision because I am not sure it is my right to keep the information from them.

They are only 6 months old so we have not told them anything yet.
I would appreciate seeing people’s opinions about this. Especially opinion from someone who has a twin.

Over the years I have seen interviews with adult twins where they set great store by their birth order. E.g saying one should know better because they are elder by 5 mins.

This is joking - surely you realise that!! I think you need to lighten up.

Haha of course people on here think my friends tangled birth was a fairytale Typical mumsnet. Something sounds unusual so of course it’s not true!

I ve twin boys too...so congratulations.
Its an amazing experience.

Mine are 1 minute apart and its on the birth cert as t1 and t2 (twin 1 and 2) but not the time.
I never kept it a secret from them but my friend did from hers.
In my case they went through a stage of "i m older so i m the boss" so i made them sit down and we did a stopwatch for a minute...felt long that way but in reality its really less than a kettle boiling so the tiny bit of time became real to them and they laughted at how silly that was.
My friend however faced a world of trouble (teenagers) hiding birth certs ...trying to make them equal...in reality they are equal but unique and birth time is really only one of the differences with twins.
Mine are id and to be honest i ve tried to make them different...celebrate the differences because they are different and unique.
I love telling them how they were born. They love the story. Mine are ivf and they know that too.
My daughter isnt and she knows her story so why wouldnt they.
Now their older we do a cake for one at their minute and for the other a minute later. It was at night so its a little weird thing we do just as a family....
I know it sounds daft but as time passes you ll know what to do yourself.
Be careful of digging a hole you cant get out of though

I imagine they will want to know; aren't you worried they will think you're an unreasonable weirdo by refusing to tell then something so simple?

I'm an identical twin and are times are recoded. Scotland records all times of birth for singles, twins, triplets etc. I'm eldest by 8 minutes!

I'm a twin, my sister is 5 minutes older ( c section) so we have the "I'm the oldest so I get first choice", " I'm your baby sister, so you have to be nice" banter all the time. Doesn't mean anything and nobody ever expected me to lag behind for the sake of 5 minutes. She walked first, I talked first.

Too late for you now, but my friends who have twins ensured that twin 2 was first alphabetically. So the "younger" twin would be first in the school register etc. If you want to call your twins, for example, Charlòtte and Lucy, Twin 1 would be Lucy and twin 2 would be Charlotte.

To pp, Birth certificates don't have time of birth on. Only date.

My twin boys know. Neither care.

To pp, Birth certificates don't have time of birth on. Only date.

Hilarious, that despite tons of posts pointing out that birth certs for multiple births DO have the time, you persist in posting this!

@titchy, I posted once not numerous times so sent be a complete arse, assuming that's possible for you.

All birth certificates in Scotland have the time of birth on them.

@Minowskisbutterfly

They have to find out eventually so you may as well tell them when they ask. Yes, my twins do argue about it sometimes but it's only one of the 3 billion gripes they have with each other. Where I live, some people consider the second born twin to be the eldest so it sort of evens out!

It’s part of your ‘story,’ the time you were born. They should know.

Is the time of birth really on the BC?!
I never realised this, don't recall seeing it in my DD's

I have twins. 20 seconds between them, only different times on the birth certificates because the clock ticked over. DS loves being the big brother and DD loves being the little sister. All said non seriously.

If you don't make a big deal out of it then nobody else will. It sounds like you are making a big deal of it though. If you don't then the inlaws will just get eyerolls if they try going on about it.

Sorry - just read that they do for multiple births!

nonnymum I'm only on page 5 but just incase it hasn't sunk in from the numerous posts up to that point, in England, if you are a twin, triplet etc the time is stated. If you aren't, it isn't. I was born in En g land, I have a time on my birth certificate, because I am Twin.
Appologies if the penny has dropped between page 5 and page 10

If they ask you should tell them, so bizarre to withhold that sort of information

My identical twin girls 8yrs old now, were born 29 minutes apart (natural birth- had to wait to check safety of twin 2 arrival because she was footling- thankfully she was born easily- footling)
I think its really unfair when people are always asking 'so who's older''? so the older always gets to attention and the younger maybe feels second best or something...
I always tell them ''your the exact same age, just one born first, no difference who's born first. That way I at least feel I appeased the 'younger one''.

You’re overthinking this. My DTs have always known, they really don’t care

As a parent of twins I'd say you're completely over thinking this and taking a throw away comment said in jest far too seriously.

The birth certificate has the time on (I have twins) and the registrar said it was so they knew for legal purposes eg inheritance, it's never bothered mine one way or the other, they were less than a minute apart (c-section) but one is officially a minute older and they know which one of them it is

OP, you are really overthinking this. It will be a source of banter, nothing more.