Every Question You've Ever Wanted To Ask About Twins Answered!

So I get asked A LOT of questions about the girls, and I totally get it. Before I had twins (and before I was even pregnant with them) I had lots of questions! I would never stop a twin mom to ask her, but I would always think about tonnes of things I would have asked. 

So I've tried to answer all of them, some of them I get asked daily by complete strangers and others I get asked a lot by friends who are super curious. So I hope someone finds this interesting.

1. Are they identical?

The most common question I get after (are they twins?) is are they identical? The answer is no, they are fraternal. This means that they were two separate eggs (identical being one egg that split into two).  They do a test on the placenta after they are born to determine if they are identical or not. But I was fairly certain they were fraternal because as SOON as they were born I saw two completely unique faces.

2. When did you find out you were having twins?

So this is an interesting answer, officially at our 8-week dating scan. But I found out I was pregnant at 3 weeks and immediately after that, I started having dreams about twins. Obviously I never EVER thought I was carrying them, but it was super weird. They were incredibly vivid and scary. 

3. Do twins run in your family?

Nope, not in mine. But very distantly in Dave's. Which is strange because fraternal twins are usually hereditary, and Identical is a completely spontaneous event. So once again we are trail blazers hahaha, and now I've started it in my family. Yay me - also sorry Penny and Lizzy.

4. How do you tell them apart?

It's interesting that I get asked this questions a lot, even after telling people they are fraternal. But they look completely different. Penny has blue eyes and a very round face, and Lizzy has brown eyes and a more rectangular face. Also Lizzy is smaller than Penny.   

5. Do I have a favourite?

This one makes me laugh, no one would think to ask this of a parent who had children of different ages. But for some reason it's asked a lot of twin parents. The answer is no, I don't. Each day one will be more pleasant than the other. So I guess it changes everyday, I like whichever one is being quiet that day. 

6. Is one of them the evil twin?

Hahahahah, I love this one. I suspect Lizzy is the evil one ... she has that look. That ...I'm calculating how to get back at you look. Mark my words, she's a beautiful scary genius! 

7. Do they have assigned car seats, cots, pram chairs, and dummies? 

They have assigned cots, but everything else I just swap them around because the day is too hectic to keep remembering where I put them  Also Penny likes to "swap" dummies with Lizzy, and by swap I mean she just steals Lizzy's dummy and crawls away with both ... so it's hard to keep them assigned, I just make sure they are both clean. 

8. Do they sleep at the same time - and do they wake each other up in the middle of the night? 

They go to sleep at the same time, but they don't sleep for the same amount of time. Lizzy is a catnapper and Penny is a long napper - and then at night they will go down at the same time, and will roughly wake up around the same time. Also yes, they wake each other up. It's very annoying hahahah. 

9. What do you do if you're alone and you have to put them both to sleep? 

Lizzy gets tired before Penny does. Also she's pretty quick to get to sleep once she's tired. So I put her to sleep first while Penny plays on the floor. I need to pick the right time, because if I wait too long Penny will cry while she's waiting for her turn. Also Lizzy doesn't seem to mind Penny's crying while she's going to sleep, but Penny can't handle Lizzy's crying. Also if I pick the magic moment, I can put Lizzy in her cot awake and sit with Penny on the rocking chair and put her to sleep and sometimes Lizzy will drift off while I'm putting Penny to sleep. But that is very rare haha. 

And if I don't catch the right time, and everything is awful then I just drive them to sleep. I've become a podcast person. LOL!

10. How do you breastfeed them, do they have an assigned boob or do you swap them around? 

Well, for the first 6 months they had an assigned boob, and I fed them at the same time in the football hold on a big twin feeding pillow. So their legs were under my arms. Then we discovered that Lizzy wasn't creating enough milk for herself so I started swapping them around for each feed. And when I'm home I still feed them on the twin pillow at the same time. But when I'm out in public I feed them one at a time. 

Also in the middle of the night I'll feed them one at a time, because it's impossible to get them both back into their cots at the same time on my own. 

11. Do they sleep together in the same cot? 

No not anymore, they did for about the first 3 months. But then they moved to separate bassinets and then cots. Especially once Penny started rolling over. 

12. Do you have to buy two of everything? 

Short answer no. We bought two cots and two bassinets and two car seats. But in regards to toys and walkers and bouncers and things like that, we are just using what we already had for Bradley. 

13. Do you bath them at the same time? 

Yep, they sit in these little ring things that are suctioned to the bath. (so they don't slip over). Also most of the time they all bath together with Bradley. But I'm super lazy, they only bath like once a week at the moment. 

14. Were we trying for twins? 

This one always leaves me speechless .... how ... how could I ... what would I .... how?! No, no we weren't trying for twins - and because it didn't really run in the family we weren't even thinking about it. IT WAS A COMPLETE SHOCK.

15. Do they have twin telepathy? 

I don't know, it's kinda hard to tell on 10 month olds. But I have noticed that sometimes if they are in separate rooms, if I make one giggle, the other one will laugh too. Even if they can't hear each other. No idea if thats twin telepathy or just coincidence but there you go. 

16. How do we do it? 

We don't have a choice man, it's not like we can give one back lol. But we do have a lot of help from our parents, so on those days when we just can't function, there's usually a family member to take a child for a bit so we can have a little down time. It takes a village right!

17. Will you have anymore children?

Did you know your chances of having twins double after having twins. No we won't be having anymore children - also please stop asking people that. It's a weird question to ask ... you're basically talking about their sex life - also it can bring up a lot of painful things, maybe they can't have any more kids and they really want to ... and you asking is just a reminder that they can't. Bottom line, it's not your place to ask. 

18. What's the weirdest thing someone has asked you about twins?  

Were they natural or IVF. This question is weird, intrusive and a bit insulting. Once again, they are asking about my ability to conceive and my sex life - and this is usually asked by complete strangers, people who just stop me in the mall. Like .... no, that's not appropriate. I don't go up to strangers and go, hey do you have the ability to have children? 

They were natural ... incase anyone was wondering ... which I know you all were while reading the above comments  

19. Do I dress them in matching outfits all the time?  

I am not opposed to matching outfits, I think they are super cute - and because they don't look super similar I think it works. But most of the time I dress them in complementary outfits, so same clothes but different colours, or same patterns but one is wearing pants and the other is in a dress. Things like that. 

20. How is Bradley adjusting to his new sisters?

He loves them, he really is a great big brother. He calls them "his babies" - and if they aren't in the car when we pick him up from daycare he will always go "where are my babies?" - it makes me happy. 

Hopefully I've covered everything in those questions now, I couldn't remember all of them but those are the ones I get asked most often. If you have a question, please ask me - the more detailed the better. Also I don't mind talking about twin pregnancy or the labour, or what it's like raising them. I just have a little bit of an issue about being asked about conceiving and things like that. You just don't know what's going on behind closed doors, and what might seem like an innocent question can cause a lot of pain for some people. So just think before you ask a stranger a question like that. 

But I am an open book, so any other questions you have, fire away!

I hope everyone is doing well at this bonkers time right now!

Wishing everyone a lot of love

Kirsten