In previous years we have asked our twins to share any memories or women they want to honour for International Women’s Day.
Here are just some of the few incredible women that were mentioned!
Jill & Laura
“In honour of International Women’s Day I’m celebrating my amazing identical twin sister Jill who herself has identical twin girls, Aurora ‘Rory’ and Clara – they recently turned 18 months old! They are the coolest and funniest girls on the planet and I watch them with absolute fascination. It is mine and my twin’s duty to set the best example to them of how lucky it is to be a twin and to celebrate it! In the photo, completely unplanned, we are all coordinating tops and bottoms (as are the front doors in the houses behind us)!”
Francina & Vanessa
“We are facing one of our biggest challenges this International Women’s Day year as identical female twins with one of us being diagnosed with breast cancer. Having a mastectomy and facing chemotherapy, all I could think about was how different I would look to my twin. We even joked about Vanessa wearing a head scarf when we go out as we love the ‘are you twin’ comments.
We are both clinicians and Christian’s giving us resilience and the ability to face challenges head on. Vanessa has been a constant support, and we are celebrating that the genetic test came back negative, reducing my twins’ risk of having breast cancer. I feel safe knowing my twin is there and am so grateful for my older sister as well. My prognosis is good so looking forward to beating my cancer and getting back to “double trouble” outings with my twin.”
Jill & Melissa
“International Women’s Day meant nothing to me, but it did to my twin, best known as Jill Saward. Before her death in 2017, she worked tirelessly for women who’d been subjected to Rape or sexual abuse, and victims/survivors of domestic abuse. As identical twins it sometimes made life difficult. People felt through her work they knew me, but also total strangers would ask me how she was. Her impact really hit me after her death. Her friends and campaigners became my friends too – all women!”
Margaret & Barbara
“I would like to celebrate mothers of twins! Our mother never grew tired of telling the story of how she had the surprise of her life when she was told there’s another baby after I was born. It can’t have been easy bringing up twins in the 1960’s and we only really appreciated this when my son and his fiance became the parents of twins in 2022! Watching them cope with tiny twins night and day has raised so many questions about our own early years. Sadly, we are not able to ask our mum about it as she passed in 2020. The photo attached was taken on her last Mother’s Day, during lockdown when we could not bear to leave her alone all day. Barbara and I will be forever grateful for everything she did for us.”
