"My twin and I shared a life, now I'm on a separate path without her. Since the loss of my twin in December 2022, I'm a singleton for the first time. Having downsized to a small cottage in August 2023 that needs work, a year and a half after my twin passed, my first trip out to a local window showroom, and my struggle is there.
It was your average day, something you would routinely do. But the light bulb moment came, it hit me that my twin wouldn't be doing it. Her life cut short. The concept of 'going it alone' couldn't have been any more evident in that moment. Being a twin never leaves, it's there as you wake, as you try to sleep, as you go about your life.
Two years on, and it’s not guilt I feel. It’s the life we never got to live; it was our environment, upbringing, our relationship, its tensions and challenges, as I now try to pick up the pieces on my own and to build something new for the first time, without her in my life. It's the difficulties we had, but most of all, it's the loss of her energy, of her presence. Her energy lingers, even now. Her energy is a big loss.
She's gone too soon. There are things I wanted to physically say. There are things I would want us both to change, things that both of us needed to change, but I know we never can. Being a twin never fades. It lingers in the memories, the quiet moments where I still expect her response. As time moves on, it's still raw, now unspoken, but she's still part of me."
