I HAVE TWIN FATIGUE !
DR. WALLACE: I’m so tired of sharing every single birthday with someone else! This happens every year because I have a twin sister. This means I never have a day just for myself. And what makes matters worse is my mother often buys us the same gifts and we end up being dressed in similar clothes all the time. We’re both going to turn 16 in March, and my mom is already setting up one big Sweet 16 party for the two of us with everything choreographed around being twins, with two sets of everything like we just walked off Noah’s Ark! I love my mom and my sister very much, but sometimes this all feels like it’s too much to handle.
Our family plays the game whereby parents treat everyone and everything exactly the same and everything runs on an ongoing familiar routine. I feel like I need a little “me” time and I crave the opportunity to break free from the cookie-cutter routine I feel trapped in.
Will I ever have anything unique of my very own? — Tired Twin, via email
TIRED TWIN: You already have the most important unique feature of all. Even though you may share a lot with your twin, you do have your own very unique personality.
Use the passion you feel now for your independence to help you think of ways to demonstrate and enjoy your independence. Find a way on your own, with your parents’ permission, to earn a little extra money with a suitable part-time job. You can use the funds you earn to open a bank account and to spend a portion of your earnings on unique clothing accessories that your sister will not have. This will begin the differentiation process by allowing the two of you to be dressed slightly differently, and although you love your twin and your family very much, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to demonstrate your own sense of style and taste.
Speak openly to your mother about the reason you’d like to be granted permission to get a small part-time job, perhaps babysitting or some other similar endeavor, so that you can begin to create your own unique path through life. I trust there is a happy point in the middle whereby your mother can enjoy having twin girls and you can also enjoy being the wonderfully unique, special young lady that you are.
MY SISTER IS NOT TALKING TO ME
DR. WALLACE: I don’t know specifically what I did, but my sister won’t talk to me lately. For the past five days I’ve noticed that whenever I make a comment toward her, she simply looks away and walks down the hall or to her room.
After a few days I actually asked her why she wasn’t speaking to me, and she said that I was “too sensitive” and that there was nothing wrong. I know something is wrong, but she still won’t talk to me about whatever it is!
How can I get her to talk to me openly about whatever is bugging her? — The Non-Silent Sister, via email
THE NON-SILENT SISTER: It could be that you are indeed being too sensitive, and your sister is just going through something small on her end.
On the other hand, your intuition could actually be quite correct, but there is no way to know for sure which of these two possibilities, or any other for that matter, might be true.
As you can’t guess what the problem might be nor read your sister’s mind, you should do the next best thing. I suggest that you simply stop asking her what’s wrong and instead let her know that you are there for her if there’s anything she ever wants to talk about.
In the meantime, be friendly, smile at her a lot and tell her that you love her. Then go about living your life and at some point, she will likely gravitate back toward more normal and meaningful interactions with you. Until then, you’ll have peace of mind by letting go of worrying about the situation and knowing that you’ve cleared the air by letting her know how much you care for her and that you are there to help her anytime she needs you to.
Dr. Robert Wallace welcomes questions from readers. Although he is unable to reply to all of them individually, he will answer as many as possible in this column. Email him at rwallace@thegreatestgift.com.
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