Twins

[jennayoung99]

Originally Posted by MyGlorylife I've been prego with twins 3 times. All mc'd with one exception- my son David. My mom lost my twin, her mom her twin. I have a friend that is a micro biologist out of Stanford U and she has twins. She explained it this way- "Fraternal is from mothers side because the mom drops more than 1 egg. Identical is from fathers side- there is something in the genetic code that makes the cells split. Lots of times when someone believes twins "skip generations" it's usually because there were say fraternal twins born but they were boys so they passed the gene onto their children. Their daughters then had twins. This the "skip". My friend Angie had fraternal twins on her side and her husband identical. Their first preg was identical twins. Later on they had a "surprise" singleton. She didn't want to risk having quadruplets (fraternal twins that both split into identical twins to equal 4) so they used birth control. Lol Fraternal is what runs on my side.

i've also read a study about how the identical can be on the mothers side as well, something about how the egg membrane can be genetically weaker, making it easier to split. it also went on to say that very new eggs (like in teens) and older eggs (like in mature mothers) are more likely to split because of this as well.

and very cool about your friend! genetics are awesome!!

[thealmightyme]

I had naturally occurring fraternal twins. I was 30 when I had them. Twins do not run in my family.

[THBVsMama]

My brother and SIL have two sets of spontaneous twins. 11 year old fraternal girls and 5 year old boy/girl twins. No fertility meds either time (both pregnancies were a surprise) and no twins on either side of the family.

[dani_p]

I once asked my husband if he had any twins in his family and he said, "No." Two weeks later, he starts a story with, "My mom's twin brother...." Men...

More fun twin facts: there is such a thing as half-identical twinning. An egg splits in two and is fertilized by two separate sperm. The two babies share half of the same genes.

No twins here.... I just find this all very facinating.

[kcprochazka]

We have been pg with 3 sets of twins. 2 sets were fraternal (we lost one of the fraternals in the last pg so we ended up with a singleton from that pregnancy) and one set ID. I have read conflicting things about what causes ID twins - I just don't think anyone has a clue. I've read it's the enzyme in the man's sperm that's the most likely trigger, but they have no idea why and it's just a theory. So we must have a "perfect storm" if that's the case. A hyperovulating woman getting together with a man who has the enzyme. But if that's truly the case it wouldn't explain how an egg can split by itself (although I know that's rare). :hmm:

We have no family history by blood (my dad's uncle has a set of fraternals, but because the dad has nothing to do with hyperovulation the gene couldn't come down from his side and was from his uncle's wife, who we have no blood relation to.) I'm the first in my family to have children, so it will be interesting to see if my sisters (I have 3) have multiples.

[JackieMarieVDV]

I don't have twins but the study of twins is very neat. My mom is an identical twin, and I think her father was a twin but his twin brother died at birth. My husbands grandparents had some twins in their families too. This is all pretty distant though, so really we don't have any direct twins in our family, and my mom is an identical twin so that is not hereditary. It would be really neat to have "spontaneous twins" but I think I would prefer one, the idea of twins really intimidates me. Don't take this wrong way though, I would still be happy with twins (every child is a blessing), just really nervous.