How much of a problem does birth order bragging cause?

[e3chick]

A twin mum at my daughter's school hasn't told her six year old boys which one was born first. I don't know her well to talk to, so I don't know all the details of why she decided to take this strategy.
Does it cause a lot of issues and boasting for twins if they know which one is slightly older?

I hadn't really considered it as anything more than a small thing until I heard about this mother, but there is probably so much I need to think about.

I have told my twins that my son was born first by 1 minute - only because they started to ask.

No problems at all so far. My daughter did ask why he was born first and I said that she pushed him out as she was desperate to get out herself. They both thought this was hilarious.

I also told them their weights - he was 7lbs 11 and she was 6lbs 14 and my daughter wanted to know why my son cost more!

I've not had any 'I was born first' so far but then they are only 7 so we shall see

I haven't had anything like that said yet either and mine are 9, but they are boys.

From my experince of some girls...it maybe more of a twin girl thing!!

I have 5 year old girl/boy twins too and the only thing mentioned by them was from DTD to DTS..Have you forgotten i am your twin?? i am your twin you do not argue with me!! and twin brother excepted this...for about 5 mins!!

Ha, 5 hours later and mine would have been born in different years!

Mine know. There are 17 minutes between them. I went with the idea that truth is best, they'd find out someday, why hide it?

One thing that didn't work for me was trying to keep things equal and fair between my children. It caused arguments. Now I drum into them that every person gets different things at different times and that we are good at different things. It is helping them accept differences.

e3, that is hilarious, can you imagine!

"yes, we are twins"
"no, there is a year between you"
"no, there are minutes between us"
"you are so not twins"
"we are"
"not"
"are"

I have told mine it will be a surprise for their 18th birthday. They speculate till the cows come home

I've told my three and so many people ask so it would be difficult to keep it a secret from the dds.

at 3 they were more interested than competitive about it. we shall see.

Mine asked. What's interesting is that they were taken out (emergency c-section) in the wrong order to what they would have come out if my planned natural birth had been successful! ie twin 1 became twin 2 and vice versa. Was VERY confusing at the time until we named them! Doesn't seem to be causing any long-lasting damage though! Thought twin 1 who became 2 might have been a bit peed off by his brother pipping him to the post but doesn't seem to have happened

oh kathryn, that must have been hugely confusing!!! You start building a relationship with Twin 1 and Twin 2 when they are inside and that must have been hellish!!!!!

The time of birth is mentioned on the birth certificate anyway, so they could find out that way if they were interested. People try to guess which twin is the eldest (and they usually pick the bossier one) so maybe it would be nice to know. Why would anyone not say anyway? It seems odd to me. My mother told me my sister kicked me out, and that's why I was born first by 20 minutes. Her doctor told her that one baby was a couple of weeks older than the other, and she had conceived twice on separate occasions (polyovulation runs in our family, hence 22 recorded pairs fraternal twins going back to late 1600s). LouMacca - one minute??? Crikey. No rest for the wicked...

LouMacca...I am filing that response for when I get asked!

My sister was born 9 minutes before me and we have known this for as long as I can remember! Never caused any arguments between us, we argue about almost everything else though! I am now pregnant with twins and hadn't even considered not telling them if they ask!

My DT's don't have the time they were born on their certificates or the fact that they were twins, does anyone else???

Patti, my twin boys have time of birth and the fact they are twins on their certificate. As well as number of older siblings (ie twin 1 had 1 older sibing (older sister) whilst twin 2 has 2 older siblings) I remember this 'cause the registrar forgot to change the sibling bit initially and was really annoyed as she had to go back and amend it

Forgot to add, I'm in Scotland

I might get in contact with the GRO as DH went and got them done at the hospitals register office maybe she didn't know that she had to put those details in!!!

In DH's family, primogeniture rules, i.e. the oldest male child inherits the estate. As we have a dd and are expecting identical twins, birth order would really matter if they turn out to be boys (I'm only 11 weeks).
I can see no reason not to ignore the inheritance rules as absurd and out dated, but DH has the crazy idea that no-one can ever know who came out first, we get the dr/midwife to mix them up. Not sure how this will work if they are different sizes though...
But I can definitely see reasons for not telling everyone.

Mine aren't hugely bothered but mostly because Wee Weapon 1 is smaller than Wee Weapon 2. So when WW1 brags about being first WW2 brags about being bigger.

Did cause confusion for a year or so when they couldn't work out why the smallest didn't equal the youngest!