twin, and make a decision which one of us was going to be pushed, I might as well jump.ââ
Donald Keith, seventy-two, a former army major who cofounded the Center for the Study of Multiple Birth with his twin, OB-GYN Dr. Louis Keith, is unapologetic about the seniority of twinship. âI say topeople, âYou as a mother or father are not going to get between those two people. You, as a spouse, will have your own place, but youâre not going to get between those two people. However, if you get between the two, look out. Because you may lose.â My second wife couldnât stand the relationship. She was against my being that close to Louis and talking to him every day. I could talk to him from my office but not from home. It hurt me and he knew it, and he was hurt. Iâve now been married to my third wife twenty-two years, and weâve tested our patience with each other on many occasions because of what I did
with
Louis or
for
Louis. Because it came before what
she
wanted.â
âI think that anybody who marries a twin,â Debbie says, âhas to understand that theyâre marrying two people. Men who marry twins get all the disadvantages and none of the advantages of marrying two women.â She says it can be unsettling. âTwo years ago I went out with a gentleman who was forty-seven, single, never been married, an only child. And we had one of the best dates I ever had. But afterward, he never called. Okay, so that could be a typical girl story. My girlfriend looked into itâshe happened to be dating his buddyâand she said, âThatâs odd that Jim didnât call Debbie.â And Jim said, âYeah, I thought she was hot, but you know what? Sheâs a twin.ââ
Lisa sums it up gravely: âHe couldnât handle that.â
Debbie: âHe couldnât handle the
âWeâ
world.â
Debbie admits that her confidence as a desirable woman is shaken when Lisaâs not at her side. âIâm so used to being looked at, I could walk into a huge trendy restaurant with Lisa and Iâd be fine. If I walk into that same restaurant and someone looks at me, and Iâm by myself, I get very insecure. I think, What are they looking at? Sure, I could say to myself, Maybe theyâre looking because Iâm pretty or something. But I canât. I am telling you, with Lisa next to me, I will dance on a bar; I can stand in front of a thousand people and give a speech. I could have stuff hanging out of my nose, or my zipper could be open, but when Iâm with Lisa onstage, Iâm in my element. Because theyâre not looking at
me;
theyâre looking at
us
. A guy once said to me, âI donâtwant to know about your twin thing; what are
you
like?â I froze and started to feel upset. Because I couldnât answer him.â
Lisa underscores this: âThe twins business is what we do; itâs also who we are. To divide the two is difficult.â
And they feel lucky for it. âWhy does
everybody
want to be a twin?â Debbie reminds me. âWeâre all looking for that relationship that twins were born with. Everybody wants to be loved that much.â
âItâs definitely a universal wish or aspiration,â affirms psychologist Ricardo Ainslie, who has treated twins, is the author of
The Psychology of Twinship
(1997), and whose mother is an identical twin. A Mexican-born forty-eight-year-old who teaches at the University of Texas at Austin, Ainslie explains the idealized twin connection by invoking one of the prevailing theories about child development: that primary relationships are âsymbioticââbetween baby and parent, or baby to baby in the case of twins. âThereâs an experience of self and other as being one,â Ainslie tells me. âA complete closeness. A sense of immersion in another person that feels whole and complete and almost ideally satisfying.