Growing up as a twin is a unique experience that only other twins truly understand. The first thing people want to know when they find out you are a twin is: are you identical and what is it like?
I have a twin brother, Larry, so we are not identical, and if you don’t understand why just think for a second.
We are fraternal twins.
From preschool all the way through high school, we have been in the same grade at the same school with the same people and friends. Throughout grade school, we didn’t have a class together but our teachers knew we were twins and would sometimes pull one of us from our own class for an activity so they could take a picture for our parents.
People always imagined that we liked the same things and were good at the same things. Once we got into middle school and high school, we would have the same teachers for the same classes at different times or a year after one or the other had. Larry has always been better at math than me, so he was a year ahead of me in math and I would have the same teacher as he a year later and they would always be surprised when I was not good at math like Larry.
Something I remember from growing up is that we were always compared or counted as one person. Our parents did a good job treating us as two individual people but others just assumed that we were basically the same person.
While we have some similar interests and friends, we also have many differences. For example we both played soccer throughout high school and both played instruments in the concert band. But I am more interested in reading, writing and art while Larry is more interested in math, video games and cars. Just to show you even more, Larry’s major in college is Accounting and mine is Journalism.
We graduated from high school in 2020 and decided to go to different colleges. I am attending Kent State University and Larry is at home attending Butler Community College. In my opinion it has improved our relationship by having some space.
When I came to Kent last year, people didn’t know I had a twin brother unless I told them. It was an experience that I have never had before, where I wasn’t automatically attached to another person. Also, no one could compare me to Larry because they have never met him.
We definitely fight a lot less now that we are both in college and if we do ever fight or I am just done talking to him, I can just stop answering his Snapchats/text messages. Before that wasn’t an option because we lived together, went to school together, played the same sport, had similar friends and worked together. There was no place to get away from each other but now there is.
We will always have a unique relationship because we are twins and no matter where we are in our lives we will always have each other.