Twins who grew up in the role of the caretaker often struggle to not repeat that behavior in other intimate relationships. Even when a twin successfully discards this role with her sibling, she may consciously or unconsciously duplicate this behavior with friends, other family members, and significant others. An adult twin woman in her thirties, whom I will call Cherie, continually gets herself in trouble by putting the needs of her friends first. She has tremendous difficulty saying no to […]
Tag Archives: boundaries
Getting Out of Our Comfort Zone
The keynote speaker at my son’s graduation ceremony emphasized principles that are currently trendy in business and psychology: the importance of failure and the courage to take risks. He asserted that essential emotional growth happens when we learn from failure and get out of our comfort zone. I thought about these principles as I listened to a mom of four-year-old fraternal twin daughters talk about her parenting challenges. Neither of the girls sleeps through the night. One, whom I’ll call […]
It’s Hard Work Now—the Payoff Comes Later
I continue to be awed by an acquaintance of mine who is a mom to eight-year-old identical twin girls. Some people comment that having twins is like having two singletons born close together, but without the experience of parenting identical twins, a person might never understand how difficult daily parenting decisions are with two same-age children. Let me give you an example. My friend decided to make a chart so that each of her daughters could work on behaviors that […]
Managing Motherhood and Multiples
A few weeks ago, I acted as a cofacilitator for a small group of women with young twins. Most of the issues that the moms discussed are familiar and expectable challenges associated with raising multiples. One mom with ten-month-old twins talked about difficulties related to feeding and sleeping. She shared her story about a traumatic three-year battle with infertility that contributed to her unmitigated anxiety and feelings of helplessness during her pregnancy and after the children’s birth. Her boy/girl twins […]