Being a first-time parent can be extremely difficult.
And by no means does it make parents experts just because the first time around justified sufficient experience to raise a second or third child successfully.
Try raising twins.
Curious to hear from parents who know a thing or two about identical twins, Redditor trashconverters asked:
"Parents of identical twins, how did you avoid getting them confused as babies?"
Everyone has their own unique methods.
Getting Acquainted
"It doesn’t take long as a parent of identical to figure out who is who. We had the toe nail painted for maybe a week before it was easy to tell who was who. "
– FBG-123
"My nieces are 13 now and they like to paint their toenails and leave the big toe for the color they had as infants. It's pretty darn adorable!"
– Pitiful_Winner2669
Remembering Names
"Back in the 90s, a tiny drop of nail polish on the toe (careful to be sure they can't put their foot in their mouth. Different color clothing."
"Most importantly, using their names with them individually is super important. Repetition of their names means they will start to look and respond to their own name early."
– MyCouchPulzOut_IDont
The Paws Are Telling
"They take babies' footprints! Just check your footprints! Though if you did get switched, take the secret to your grave, because I don't even want to think about what unwinding that paperwork nightmare would be like."
– gringledoom
Instincts Kick In
"So this would be 2011, they put a hat with Baby A on my first son and hat with Baby B on my second as well as bracelets. I was with them the whole time for the weighing and vitals check and they take foot prints right away."
"For my wifes sanity she put a little sharpie dot on Baby A's sole of his foot. Then within a day, you kind of just knew. They're identical, but family and all their friends can tell them apart pretty quickly even if you try and trick them."
"It's tough to explain unless you have friends that are twins you understand it."
"I still call them the wrong name but all parents do that. I called one by the dogs name once. That cost me an apology and a Lego set."
– CTnaturist
Color Coding
"We had identical twins in my daycare room and they were honestly the most similar twins I've seen. Plus I was in infant A room and sometimes the littlest babies don't really have their defining features yet. It took two weeks for me to be confident in who was who."
"The mom did the same things you did but would keep the toenails painted. She also color coded their daycare clothes and bottles for us. A was blue and B was green just to be safe."
"She admitted that it took her panicking night 1 at home after cutting the hospital bracelets off for her to start. We really appreciated the color coding. It helped immensely."
– MsLauryn
Identifying Aura
"When our twins came along, we decided to assign each a color – one was always in blue, the other in green. It started off as a practical thing, but as they got older, they each developed a preference for their own color, it became part of their individual identity."
"As funny as it sounds, that color coding stuck with them and now as teenagers, their rooms are themed around their colors, their gadgets and even their bikes. It's hilarious looking back at baby pictures trying to figure out who's who, but now, we can tell them apart by the color aura they literally chose to live."
– Edda_Housand
Defining Characteristics
"It wasn't that hard; one was always just a bit chunkier than his brother. That one also had a scar on his chest from when liquid was removed from his lung. The freckles are different. They sound different, have different mannerisms."
"For my own ease I did dress them in different colors, and I tried to keep bracelets made of embroidery floss on them. That didn't work entirely to plan; one would always rip his off but the other really liked his bracelet and I had to replace it when it got worn for the first four years of his life."
"People have a hard time mentally handling twins, especially identical ones, but they're just two brothers who look very related."
– lyan-cat
A Weighted Issue
"My brother used to have a set of identical twins for best friends. One was always chunky the other wasn't. But it was no help telling them apart because it would switch. If the chunky one lost weight, the other gained it. It was if they had a set weight to share between them."
"I finally learned to tell them apart because twin A flirted with me, twin B didn't."
– Coconut-bird
Make No Mistake
"One had slightly green eyes, brown hair and would always lay on the right side when asleep.. the other one had a penis."
– The-truth-hurts1
Oh, Eye See
"As a step-mom to fraternal twins and biological mom to identical twins and fraternal twins one thing i did with my identical twins is i always watched their eye color because though identical i was noticing how my identical twin daughters blue eye color would change so one of my twins has her left eye dark sapphire blue and her right eye light sky blue whereas her twin sister has her left eye light sky blue with her right eye being dark sapphire blue."
– Goddessviking86
The thought of mixups often crossed people's minds.
Twinsight
"As an adult identical twin I have wondered many times if we were accidentally switched as babies and all this time I've really been Tom. This is an actual shower thought of every identical twin lol."
– i_guess_this_is_all
"My mom had an identical twin."
"I've asked her, 'Hey, do you ever think that Grammy switched you on accident as babies? Like, if you were supposed to be Aunt Pam and she was supposed to be you?'"
"She got this look on her face and said, 'I try not to think about it.'"
– Firekeeper47
"The important things is that if the parents get confused twice you’re back to normal. As long as the parents f*ck up an even amount of times it’s all good."
"Offer not valid for triplets."
– JustTheBeerLight
Go With The Flow
"My mom and aunt were identical twins. My grandmother told the story that once when they were toddlers, she had them both in the bath tub and after done bathing, one time she drained the tub and went to grab the towel and they kind of tumbled around into each other (they were in the crawling phase) and she lost track of who was who."
"She said she just made a guess and went with it. lol."
– OldManJenkins-31
The Babysitter's POV
"i babysat identical twins. the parents dressed them the same and gave them names one letter different from each other. so name wise i couldn't. but visually i could. one twin was skinnier and smaller than the other. not by a dramatic amount but enough that you could see it."
"their father was clueless and just drew on the kids feet with something, so they were literally numbered. the thicker twin was 1 and the skinner twin was 2. also it was weird to see they had a favorite twin."
– AvocadoPizzaCat
Many Redditors seem to think the idea of color coding works, whether it involves clothing or toe nail polish, as a starting point.
What do you think parents of twins? Is this a relatable consensus?