Aimeé
The best thing about r/AskReddit is when you can peer into someone else’s life and see what it’s like to be them. And if you’re not a twin, you have almost certainly wondered what it would be like. Could you play switcheroo? Is it hard when people don’t recognize you? Have your parents mixed you up?
The answer to that last question is almost certainly YES, as the responses to a question from u/flowerpeachtrees shows. They asked, “Parents of Identical Twins, what was your ‘Honey, I switched the kids’ moment?”
Not all the responses are from actual parents who mixed up their kids, but enough are to be worrying. Who are we if we’re mixed up again and again while taking a bath with our siblings? Too complicated a question for Reddit, but ponder the nature of identity while reading these harrowing tales below.
1.
I had a classmate that has a twin sister. One day we – me, her twin, her and her boyfriend – went from school by train. Classmate sat with her boyfriend and I sat with her sister. Boyfriend had to use the toilet and when he was gone, they got an idea – apparently they never tried to switch to see if he would notice. So, they quickly switched some clothes (they were dressed similarly), changed their hair styles and switched the seats. When he came back, he looked at one, confused, then at the other, repeated the action several more times, then looked at his girlfriend and was like “Really?” while he started laughing. —AverageGirl_8
2.
My grandmother baptized the same kid twice. —Spontanemoose
3.
During a well baby check up when our twin boys were about 6 months old, they had to get two shots each. Due to lack of communication in the clinic, our oldest son got all four shots. Luckily nothing bad happened. —imnotlouise
4.
So with very few answers, I’ll answer this with a summer camp story: We were playing capture the flag, but the teams got to hide their flag. Well each team in my game had a twin on each team, and the one on my team walked over to the other teams side and asked to be reminded where their flag was. He grabbed it and ran back before anyone noticed it was the wrong one —mantistoboggan69md
5.
Mom of identicals here. Not really one moment –yet– but I had them by c-section and for some reason it’s always bothered me that I may have gotten them mixed up when we finally took the hospital bracelets off. They had no real differences as infants so I think about that at least 5 times a day. They’re 4 now. —NachoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo0
6.
Identical twin here. My dad intentionally swapped our ID bracelets many times when we were infants in order to stop any argument about who was older. His words. —dunemi
7.
I am the younger sister of identical twin brothers. My mom was so scared of switching them after removing their hospital bracelets that she painted one of their big toes just until she knew she’d be able to tell them apart. —jkav1117
8.
Once in my very large high school, I had a teacher stop mid lecture, and stated “you’re not Twin A, go switch back”. When Twin A came back to classroom he was really embarrassed at getting caught and asked how she knew. She didn’t have an answer, but apparently they had switched on at least two other occasions. Most people in the class didn’t even know he was a twin! —Wolflibrarian7
9.
Identical twin here. When I was 4, we were at Disney World with all my cousins who are around the same age. I wandered off for just a minute, and my family took that time to move on to go somewhere else. When my mom was doing a head count, my brother moved and she counted him twice, so it took them a few minutes to realize I was lost.
Some nice strangers saw I was crying and noticed I was lost, and helped look for my family. My dad eventually spotted me, and hopped over a 7 foot fence to come get me. Security didn’t like that very much and they almost kicked him out. But everything worked out in the end. —svenson_26
10.
A bit late to the party – I’m not a parent but two of my brothers are twins.
Unfortunately, twin 1 passed away about a year ago. During the wake we had TONS of pictures of him, like way more than even I expected. And one thing my mom would do with them whenever we were somewhere or doing something photo-worthy is take three pictures – one of each twin and then both together.
About halfway through the wake my family realized my mom had accidentally chosen one picture of twin 2 (every other picture but that one was of twin 1). Nobody else at the wake noticed, even the extended family couldn’t tell them apart.
Weirdly, it was actually a lighthearted moment. My whole family found it funny that just the one detail slipped through the cracks, we joked that even now both twins were still doing something together. I think we just needed something to laugh at during that time —Ambly_Andberg
