[lifelesstraveled]

but I feel more comfortable posting to this board

I have a twin sister and we both grew up in the same house and I thought we experienced the same things, but today I realized that her experience growing up HAD to have been a little different than mine, and I am not sure why. I'm starting to think (well I've always known) that something is wrong with me. Or maybe what I am remembering as my experience with my parents is completely off...?

My twin seems to have this...connection even if it's just a little one with my parents. She wants to be around them and do things with them--to a certain extent. With me, I can barely stand to be in the same room with my father for no longer than 10min, and conversations with my mother are based soley around the weather and when she tells me she loves me, I can't say it back because I don't believe her and saying it back to her would only be me lying and leave me feeling really uncomfortable.

Anyways, is it possible for my twin and I to have had a completely different experiences with our parents even though we grew up together? HOw is it possible that I grew up with virtually no attachment to my parents, but my sister seems to have some sort of an attachment to them...Im so confused.

[sittingatwatersedge]

Dear LLT, in Judith Viorst's "Necessary Losses" she mentioned Max Frisch's novel, "I Am Not Stiller".

A man went to a cemetery to visit the grave of his mother, and encountered another fellow doing the same. The two of them decided to go out for coffee afterward and talk.

They compared their experiences growing up. One had a mother who was sadly negligent, the other had one who was smothering and controlling. One had a mother who was positive and creative and encouraging; the other's mother was judgmental and unenthusiastic and dismissing.

And the two men were brothers.

Every woman with more than one child can attest to the fact that each one is a little universe in him/herself; different temperaments, different talents. Add to this the fact that parents learn as they go, and are NOT the same parent this year that they were a few years ago. You will have the answer to your question. But don't feel bad for having noticed it; there is no blame in this; IMO you are very perceptive and insightful.

[Sannah]

I think that it is possible to have different experiences. We interact with our environment and who we are and the decisions that we make affect our environment. Are you fraternal twins?