May 12, 2009

You're My Best Friend

(First a little housekeeping note: for those of you "following" this blog through Google, I intend to follow each and every one of you, but I'm having trouble uploading my profile picture. I hope to have that taken care of by the end of the week)
The dynamics of siblings who are multiples can be fascinating. It's not unusual for twins to be best friends. The bond between multiples can be quite different than the bond between siblings of different ages. When you throw higher order multiples into the mix it becomes a little trickier. The "best friends" change on a regular basis.
Take Cakes and Tortilla, for example. They are my "identicals," so they certainly have a different bond with one another than they do with Roo and Sue-Sue. When they went through their "twinspeak" phase (creating their own language), Cakes and Tortilla could understand each other with just a few grunts and gestures. Don't worry... Roo and Sue-Sue weren't left out. They knew enough of the "language" to leave me in the dark. But when it comes to being "best friends," Cakes and Tortilla aren't always drawn to one another.
My daughters have been learning about family and relationships in preschool, which, I think, is where this whole idea of best friends is coming from. Last week Tortilla told me Cakes was her best friend. Yesterday Cakes told me Sue-Sue was her best friend. It is not my place to encourage them to be just as close with one sister as they are with another. I simply hope as they grow older they realize picking a best friend among siblings could cause hurt feelings. In the end, I think all four of them will naturally share a bond that will be hard for others to understand.
When it comes to picking "best friends," Roo has been the most consistent. She routinely tells me our cat Elwood is her best friend.

7 comments:

Stephanie Manner Wagner said...

Aww! It has to be hard not to meddle a bit when picking a "best friend" may lead to hurt feelings among them.

We struggle a tad with the older 3 kids picking a favorite among the twins. They tend to pick the one that they think is most like them. Works fine now, but once the babies are old enough to see the preferences I'm going to be temped to snuff it out.

MaryAnne said...

Roo is smart to stick with the cat it sounds like! I love your blog, there are so many aspects of raising multiples that I would never take the time to stop and think about otherwise.

Emma always wants to share with the baby but not with her brother. I'm curious to see what happens once the baby is physically present rather than conveniently trapped inside my belly.

Quadmama said...

Stephanie: Interesting point about older siblings picking a "favorite" among the younger ones. I wonder how often it "changes."

MaryAnne: I have to say I laughed a bit about Emma "sharing" with her unborn sibling, rather than her ever-present brother. You'll have to update us on the dynamics once the baby is born.

Sadia said...

The combinatorial possibilities presented by higher level multiples boggle the mind. I only have two Doodlebugs, and their relationship is plenty complicated.

Quadmama said...

I think with 4 toddlers and 4 cats we have oodles of "best friend" combinations. Now I have to be able to keep track of them all.

Unknown said...

Im sure you had so much fun listening to their tailtell and stuff, that is so cute. I think they will be good friends when they grow, the bond of being sisters are forever.My sister and I fight like cats and dog as in always killing each other since we were little until we grew up but we still making up quickly. So even if you have quads, still no two individuals are exactly alike but they are always be sisters forever.
Btw, I already added your link, my Pc yesterday missing up with me hehehe.
Have a nice day!

Quadmama said...

Oh they definitely have their moments when they fight like cats and dogs, but in the end they (so far) always make up.

Post a Comment