On December 17th 2006, I distinctively remember watching them as they walked slowly to the front door. Everyone in the house ran down stairs, some with balloons in hand others with their eyes open wide and smiles plastered on their faces. Everyone watched in amazement at what was suppose to be one of the greatest days ever, but as for me, I had never been so ambivalent. This feeling of ambivalence was not something that I was foreign to feeling but at this particular moment, I struggled with myself to feel what everyone else felt although it was terribly hard. I wanted to have a smile plastered on my face and my arms open with a sense of invitation but yet my face stood still just as time did as my new twin cousins, soon to be adopted sisters entered my house for the first time. Why had I been so ambivalent? Years after their arrival I sat and processed this question and realized that my resistance to their arrival came from the fact that I had once been a twin myself.

8 years ago my parents legally adopted my twin cousins from Georgetown, Guyana. This decision took a toll on me because I was actually born a twin but as a result to complications at birth, my sister died 8 month later leaving me a “Twinless Twin”*. It may be hard to fathom how an individual could miss a person that they’ve never technically met but I am walking testimony. Knowing that the twins were coming to permanently live with us disturbed me not only because I was going to see the twin connection I never got to experience with my sister, I would also lose my rank as the baby of the family. Being 18 and just starting college I was a very sheltered child and could not wrap my head around how I could possibly accept them into my life wholeheartedly.

The twins coming to live with me made me confront the absence of my sister and my feelings surrounding it more than it ever did in my 18 years of living. Along with my sensitivity towards twins I began to notice other things that I hadn’t noticed before such as my inability to be alone. I have always had a lot of friends and have always liked being around people. I use to attribute that to my large close knit family but the weird thing about my wanting to be in the presence of people, sometimes it drastically changes and there are these off moments where I just want to stay in my room all alone and sit there in darkness with just my thoughts. Something that I’ve been known to do for as long as I could remember, an action that isn’t seen as weird but just a part of the things that I do.

In my house we never really bring up our feelings as a whole but more so when it comes to the passing of my sister, and for a long time I felt it was because my family couldn’t deal with it but now I believe it was out of protection for me. Protect me from feelings that I had no answer to or feel something for a person I spent 9 months with but never actually met.

The above is an excerpt from my Published work ” The Twinless Twin”: The Passing of a Twin and the Effects it has on the Twin that Survived. Looking back I feel like I expressed myself so well on paper but in reality I was conflicted AF! I low key was uncomfortable are my own cousins/ sisters. How could you love someone but still feel so off every time you’re in their presence . I wish I knew THEN, that it was okay for me to feel that way. That it is okay to exist in TWO TRUTHS like my graduate school professor Mr Burghardt taught me. I loved them AND they made feelings inside of me arise. Knowing the truth and ACCEPTING the truth are two different battles I was too drained to take them on at that time in my life.

Because I was so ambivalent I feel I killed any dream of us truly connecting. I killed the possibilities of being the closest we could be. Today I write this and stand strong when I say I love my twin cousins/sisters/friends. Rachel and Rushel I may not be in that “princess room” 1 door away anymore (that’s a whole different beast I’ll slay another time) but I hope that through my actions you’ve seen my growth and my genuine love for you both. I’ve been in a battle with ME, MYSELF AND I, and even though you’ve never said I’ve made you feel any way and we have streaks on Snapchat, I still want to make my self clear I LOVE YOU ! And that’s just the tea sis

You’ve been an amazing crowd. Get home safely!

-Otivia p>