A new publicity leaflet now available..

With regard to the upcoming annual meeting of embryologists in Stockholm on July 6th, I  contacted them and asked them if we may display some leaflets. They said we may, but when I looked at the literature we do have, nothing seemed appropriate.  So I got busy and made one and printed out 40 or so to send and have on display at the event.

I thought you may like to see what it looks like, and maybe download one or more for your own use:

The new book: "Womb twin survivors" out today!

The complimentary copies, that will be sent to my lovely writing mentors; the people who checked the words, gave feedback and support at every turn; not to mention the winner of the WOMBTWIN sentence competition, are to be posted shortly.

The advance orders will be fulfilled just as soon as I am able to get payment, parcel them up and get them to a post office.

There are a few last-minute revisions for Lightning Source to process, and once those are settled, in the next few days, the book will be available to order from:

Wren Publications  (Thats me: I'll send them out as soon as they are delivered to me, so feel free to place an order now, just don't hold your breath.....)

All Amazon online outlets including:

Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk
Amazon.de

Any street bookshop  (just quote ISBN 978-0-9557808-2-0)

I wonder what I used to do before I had a book to write? I suppose that, now its over, I am about the find out!!

Hoping to meet some of you in Nottingham on Saturday (see here)

New year- new adventures

2010 will, if things go well, be the year that this Womb Twin project will come of age.

I am on chapter 4 of what I hope will be the definitive book on the subject of how it feels to be a womb twin survivor.

I hope to have this finished by  September, so it will be available for the Wombtwin Conference in October.

Then I will be creating a group for the parents of womb twin survivors in Hertfordshire, England, where I live.

And a healing group for womb twin survivors in London.

We have a membership secretary for Wombtwin.com, a newsletter editor for Gemini Voices and a conference secretary for October 3rd, as of today!

We have a new patron William Bingley, of which more soon.

Our new CMS website will go online next weekend, courtesy of our website volunteer from IT4C.

It promises to be a great year!

New volunteers still needed. Even the smallest effort makes a huge difference, because we are as yet a small group.

Email me for details about anything mentioned here.

Open space event 30th Oct to 1st Nov

We did it. We held our open space event last weekend. I gave a presentation on the Friday and the Saturday was an Open Space for the womb twin survivors to decide what happened. We discussed hoarding, the vanishing twin syndrome, how to help young womb twin survivors, Brent Babcock's book "My twin vanished did yours?"  discussed by Brent himself, and much more. On the Sunday we all walked the healing path and lit small candles for our lost twins.  Lots of debating chatting mixing hugs tears laughter eating and drinking.  I loved it. Where you there? Please leave a comment and let's see what you all thought of the day.

Here's Brent addressing the audience on the subject of the vanishing twin, based on more than twenty years of his work with "vanishing twin" survivors.

Artwork for our conference display

If you are a womb twin survivor and  you would like your artwork in our art display at the open space conference in St Albans  30th Oct-1st November, this can be done.

All you have to do is make a digital image of any artwork you have done - it may be a painting a sculpture or a photo - and email it to me at info(at)wombtwin.com. Then we will place it  on our art board for everyone to see.  A title and a few words describing how the art work speaks to you about being a womb twin survivor will also help.

Deadline Thursday 29th October 12 midnight GMT.

Calling all womb twin survivors in Germany!

From Eloise today;

Hello dear Berlin Friends and loved ones

As some of you may know, I am bringing Althea Hayton (http://www.wombtwin.com/) over from the UK for the first time to Berlin on Saturday 21 November 2009 for an introductory and healing Womb Twin Workshop from 10.00 - 18.00. For full details, see the form in either English or German and email me with any further questions. I've had 8 years of personal experience with this work.

This work is fascinating and affects so many people (one in ten!). Please book now to register your place.

Payment can be made by credit card or Paypal, or personal cheque payable to "Eloïse de Hauteclocque". (see the above form to indicate which method you prefer)
It costs 70 Euros for the whole day.

Two weeks to go!

Click here to listen to my podcast about the Open Space conference.

DATE: Friday 30th October to Sunday November 1st 2009

VENUE: St Albans Girls School, Sandridgebury Lane, St Albans, Hertfordshire, AL3 6DB,

PRICE: Members £55, non-members £70

FRIDAY October 30th 7.30 - 9.30pm Public meeting

Open to all by free ticket only - please use booking form below to apply.

SATURDAY October 31st

9.30am–6pm OPEN SPACE EVENT ~

6-7 candelighting ceremony

7pm-10pm Three course buffet supper

SUNDAY November 1st 10- 2.0 pm

10-11am Annual General Meeting of Wombtwin.com Ltd

11-12.30 THE HEALING JOURNEY for wombtwin survivors

12.30 Sandwich lunch

2 pm Departures

Register here, pay later.

Open space Event 2009

We are on our way to a highly successful Open Space event in October.

See here.

Last year when we held our first conference at Southwell House it was held over just one day. People who came from far away wished that there could have been more time to talk to the other participants. This is why we are holding this year's conference over a whole weekend.

Also we wondered who we could have for a keynote speaker and we decided not to have one at all, but to let everyone and anyone speak out on any topic that they felt was important. The idea of OPEN SPACE is to give as many people as possible the chance to speak if that is what they wish to do, instead of everyone having to listen to just a few speakers, chosen in advance. To come into an OPEN SPACE space is to be allowed to listen only to what you find interesting and to feel free to wander between sessions or dip out altogether and go for a drink a snack or a walk.

The OPEN SPACE event concept is based on a simple observation, that conferences are as much about the social interaction as they are about learning something new. To be truly creative and enjoyable, a conference must be a free space in which anything can happen.

There will be a public meeting on Friday 30th October at 7.30pm to launch the weekend. Althea Hayton will make the presentation. This will be the first announcement of the results of the online questionnaire completed by 500 womb twin survivors from around the world. These have been analysed this summer with the help of the University of Hertfordshire statistics department. Entrance to this meeting open to all, by free ticket only. If you would like to come to this but not the whole weekend, please use this form to register your interest in the meeting and the tickets will be mailed to you.

On the Saturday there will be four spaces and four sessions of 90 mins in each space, so that is 16 chances for HOSTS to set up a group on any topic they want on a first-come, first-served basis. (The sessions are decided during the first hour of Saturday, 9.30 to 10.30.) Some people will come ready to host a group, with an existing idea of what people may want to do, such as sharing stories, or a workshop on personal issues such as gender energy or hoarding. Everyone else wil just come and go as they please.

We have bookings already from Portugal, Switzerland, Brazil and the USA. It promises to be a very exciting weekend! We do not arrange accomodation, but there are good hotels locally which can be booked online in advance here.

Meals and breaks: There are no set breaks: there will be drinks and sandwiches available on a self-service basis, but a three-course candlelit buffet supper wil be served on the Saturday evening in the school canteen - the cost of this meal is included in the ticket price which is £70 per head for the whole weekend.

Dont miss our Open Space event 2009! Book your place now!

Make your booking now.

wombtwin workshops ( 1) PORTUGAL

Well, a bit of a gap in these postings but it has been busy in May!

To start with, a series of workshops in Portugal. I learned more about how to balance the presentation, rich in medical detail about the lost twin and also showing some of the research results to far, and the group workshops, which allow people to contact their feelings about their own lost twin and begin to find a way forward.

It seems to depend on the audience: if there is a room full of wombtwin survivors, they will probably be anxious to get on with a workshop, but if there are a lot of psychologists, social workers etc who are not wombtwin survivors themselves ( or if they are they dont want to consider that possibility) then they will be happy to stay theoretical. At the workshop in Lisbon this became clear: we stayed theoretical because there were not all that many wombtwin survivors, but we did have some time for exercises - emptiness; being alone; being abandoned.... among other things. The exercises ended up as a kind of dramatherapy mixed with dance and ritual-I make it up as I go along because this is something we have to explore intuitively rather than be too proscriptive. The survivors found it helpful and the observers were amazed at the strength of the feelings engendered by the exercises- it would seem to be good for both groups to mix them, after all.

The main idea that came forward from this delightful weekend with wonderful people was to help the young children who are wombtwin survivors. We heard a seven year old tell the story of her own lost twin in simple ideas and words, and this seems to be the perfect thing to do: to make a simple story book with lovely colourful images using this simple story.

We know that wombtwin survivors benefit from knowing why they feel as they do, but its very hard for parents to broach the subject with their child. A story book would seem to be the answer. Claudia (who will be known to you from the forum) is masterminding this project, so comments please either here or on the forum.

The Wombtwin project comes of age

Well, I have just about emerged from a spate of activity, and have now delivered workshops in Dublin and St Albans, England. It has been an interesting journey but I do believe that at last I know enough about wombtwin survivors to deliver a soundly-based presentation, facilitate some useful workshop exercises and be able to anticipate and answer almost all the questions that arise.

As from next year, I will be charging a fee for my workshops and seminars, because I am reassured that I can deliver a professional service now. The presentation needs work, but with the fees I am earning from the workshops I should be able to afford to buy licences for the scientific images I need to be able to use them in public and also on leaflets and brochures. It should not matter so much, but somehow the idea that I now have a means of earning money from this project makes me feel as if it has in a way grown up. Its like the project and I have come of age, and we are both now more likely to be taken seriously.

I got back from Ireland a few days ago ( 55 people, lots of questions, laughter, fun, new friends - a wonderful time!) fully intending to take some time doing something completely different and ended up building two new websites! You see, the work of Wombtwin.com Ltd, the new non-profit organisation I set up in 2007, is now quite separate from what I am doing individually. That means that I ought to have my own personal website for my own work and the organisation should have a site of its own. So I have built them.

I have taken myself to my study upstairs and the two websites are now almost finished. The next note will be to say they are uploaded, like fraternal twins, suspended in cyberspace. They are both held for the moment on my own hosted space, but one day we will rent some space for the organisation website and then I will have cut the ties completely, let it all go and cut myself off, leaving Wombtwin.com Ltd to grow on its own. That feels very important to do.

It really does feel like growing up!

The New York workshop.

I haven't posted for ages, because things have been going at 100 miles an hour. We left for the USA for a long trip on 22nd September ( which turned out to be the trip of a lifetime!) and got back a few days ago.

Now I can say " I have done a workshop in New York"! It almost didn't happen. In the end we made it free of charge and Monica who arranged it for me worked hard to get me some people. After all there were 8 of us altogether, rattling round in spacious offices in Madison Avenue. One person brought his guitar because he was off to the recording studios that afternoon (that felt like a real NYC moment) ; two had come overnight and hadn't slept or eaten; one had flown in from Virginia and arrived at her friend's house at 3am. Not for the first time, I was amazed at the energy and commitment that was expressed in simply getting there.

Once again, I witnessed the glorious moments that occur when wombtwin survivors get together. There is a kind of healing energy that pervades the whole space. When we went for coffee, I found a huge social space, where we could move about. At once I persuaded/ managed? organised? the group into each doing a "personal space" exercise. It goes like this: you stretch out your arms as far as they will go, facing your palms outwards. That delineates your personal space - the tiny bit of the world over which you have dominion. Then you say "This is my personal space: it is mine. No one can take it away or make it larger. I claim it as my own." Then still with arms outstretched, the individual spins around, claiming their own space in 3D.

It was VERY hard for some, easy for others, while there were some who tried to claim more space than they truly could own. A profound experience for at least one, who has emailed me since about it.

Then it was time for the presentation: still text-heavy because I have yet to buy licences for the images, most of which are scientific and not in the public domain. This time I realised that a quick tour of fertilization, embryogenesis and fetal development will have to be included in the presentation so people can understand how twinning can happen. The work with wombtwin survivors is extending now into chimerism, and the exchange of undifferentiated embryonic cells, which largely lies outside the realm of science, so we must keep to what is known, lest we get carried away into conjecture.

Clearly, as I do workshops and show the presentation again and again, it will provide the chance to refine these ideas, as I venture into creating the Book of the Project (of which more in 2009, probably ad nauseam.)

So then we had lunch and the guitarist left, but not after we had each given him a parting gift of some kind of positive reflection on his personality. It is interesting that by truthfully showing someone their gifts (not simple flattery) in a way you give their gifts to them, because once we become aware of our giftedness then we are more likely to practice those gifts. He liked that and it helped him, he told me later.

Then I asked what everyone wanted to do? In small group this is possible. Almost everyone wanted to know about the healing process, and also about the Alpha and the Beta.

At once it was clear: we had two rooms to use, one a bland, gray and white area with a long meeting table, the PowerPoint technology etc, the other a smaller room with red walls and floor, and a round, white table. We spend the morning in the white room and went into the red room after lunch. I asked what purpose this red room was used for - it was for high-level meetings and decision making - this was the Alpha space!

At the doorway there was a threshold between the red carpet of the Alpha room and the grey of the Beta room. We then did an exercise about our personal Black Hole. As each person reflected, it became clear that most of the feelings in the Black Hole ( which is the pre-birth memory of the loss of the twin) related to the Beta space.

The healing path involves a movement from living too much of one's life in the Beta space (as the little lost twin) towards living in the Alpha space (as the living survivor) most, if not all, of the time.

So I suggested/lead/persuaded some of the participants to step into the Beta room ( which I darkened) and talk about that kept him/her there, and what it would take for them to move over the threshold and forward into the light of the Alpha space. For some it was SO difficult!

All in all, a wonderful, profound experience. I stepped out into the dark, busy streets of Manhattan with a great sense of gratitude. Thanks to you all if you are reading this - you know who you are. Thanks for coming. Keep in touch.

The next event is a meeting in St Albans on 25th October. Do come! More here.

I tell you more about that next week.

Wombtwin conference is LIVE!!

Well after two weeks of struggling with iMovie for Mac, we have four short edited videos of the wombtwin conference.

You can see them on the website here. Click the names at the side to get to the individual pages.

I have also uploaded them onto UTube ( where they come out a bit bigger but more blurry.)

I have made a wombtwin survivors group on Utube, so if you want to join, upload your own videos.

The next step is the transcripts: dont hold your breath for those, but they will come.....

The 2008 Wombtwin.com conference June 21st 2008

Well, we did it. Thirty people, nearly all of them wombtwin survivors, gathered together in a room and shared stories. Magic. An amazing sense of kinship. I enjoyed it a lot. Exhausted but very happy today, and grateful for all the help and support.

I have put some comments here that were made at the end of the day.

I put this post here so anyone who was there can say how it was for them, and what comes next. If you weren't there, tell me what you would have liked to see. Thanks.
Althea

The solstice : Wombtwin day Dec 21st, 2007

There has been a lot of interest in keeping December 21st as Wombtwin day, and it would be good to know that the idea is being spread around. I had an email exchange with a man from Australia just yesterday on a separate subject and it came up that he lost his twin two days after birth. When I told him about the solstice being Wombtwin Day, he loved the idea and decided to go walking and think about his twin. In over 40 years he has never given his twin a name but I would not be at all surprised if on this walk a name comes to him.

It may be that you are a wombtwin survivor yourself reading this, and you want to remember the day but have no clear idea what to do: the following is a suggestion.

One idea seems to be central when I talk with people about this: the idea of a river seems strong, and casting something into the water to flow gently away.

I suggest, in the interests of the environment, that flower petals (always a good symbol of a little life cut short) be gathered into a special little box, with the name of the lost twin written on the lid. Then by a river or maybe the sea, you can send your twin into the light with all your love, by casting the petals into the water and letting them float away. The empty box can be kept until next year.

I do hope that as many wombtwin survivors as possible will tell me later what they did. Certainly for some people this idea and this action will be the first step towards healing. I would love to learn more, to help more people, so please post a comment.

An annual Wombtwin day?

I have been researching St Thomas, called "The Twin" in the Bible, whose feast day is celebrated variously. This is what the Encyclopedia Brittannica has to say on the subject:

Saint Thomas born , probably Galilee

Died c. AD 53, Madras, India; Western feast day December 21, feast day in Roman and Syrian Catholic churches July 3, in the Greek church October 6

The July 3rd Festival of Twins is now well established, but that would not be the best date for surviving twins. We need another date.

Now December 21st would be good: it's 7 months before Twins Day and many twins "vanish" at around 8 weeks. It make sense also because it's a dark time and yet, once it is past, we are moving slowly and gently into the light of a new summer. So many surviving twins who have walked the Healing path with me are in a very dark place until they let their twin go - and almost at once they too are moving towards the light.

Also, being in those busy days before Christmas, many surviving twins find Christmas so hard, and it would be good to spend some time remembering our lost twins before we plunge into the festivities.

So I have made a decision: I will keep December 21st this year and every year as a special Wombtwin Day. I will spend some time remembering my twin and thanking him for all the gifts he has given me: this project being just one!!

Who would like to join me in doing this? Do post a comment if you have a good idea about what to do, and let's gather some good ideas together via this blog.

Wishing you well on your special day

Althea

Yesterday I went to a meeting of the Lone Twin network in London. They are not really set up for wombtwin survivors, but they let me in as a one- off. I was surprised that about a third the 30 attendees were "Birth-loss twins" as they describe it. I consider that they are wombtwin survivors but they are on the margins, also they are on the margins of the Lone Twin Network.

For some the level of distress was very high. Others were more sanguine. The issue of whether their parents had told them or not was a problem. Some parents mention it right at the start and some don't, finding a moment to mention it. As I have found already by email, the news didn't come as a surprise.

A difficult meeting for me, to be in a room with so much hidden (and-not-so-hidden) distress and painful loneliness. These lone twins meet for a brief time of comradeship and sharing, knowing that a whole year will pass before they meet again.

But then this is their Dream of the Womb: a brief time of close company with someone who really understands, and then abandonment for a long, long time.

It is interesting that organisations take on the characteristics of the client group: I must make sure I don't allow Wombtwin.com to remain perpetually in embryo. NO: we will allow ourselves to implant in a good and nourishing place and then begin to grow!

Well. We had the Event, we all sat round and I did the PowerPoint thing and they all went slightly glassy eyed but the pics caught their attention! (Get a sawn-off version if you want to see it yourself, on the wombtwin.com site). The UnLtd people were kindness itself and every need was met, even before I knew it. Wonderful.

"Wonderful" was the word used today by one visitor, a wombtwin survivor himself, who was in the midst of a nervous breakdown a few weeks ago but, having taken his first few steps on " The Healing Path," felt able to travel a long way alone, to be there yesterday.

"It was a wonderful day yesterday! I'm very happy that I came! Coming on my own to London was quite miraculous for me! I'm glad that I did. Being in complete isolation a few weeks ago, wanting to see no one, and then a few weeks later going on a trip is fabulous! Meeting other wombtwin survivors was a nice experience. Knowing that I am not alone with this."

It was great to be in a room with people who all wanted to know more. No cold dismissal; no scepticism. No one saying I am "dangerous" or "crazy". (That is often said.) A real treat, not to have to spend all day defending my position on this.

Nick Owen spoke about the need to develop helpful ways to integrate this into therapy, or create self help therapy. I did the science; he did the therapy. A good double act.

We all had lunch and talked some more then went to a cafe and talked even longer. I need to create lots of spaces where wombtwin survivors can be together and just feel understood. It's so great!

Plans, plans....... more in a bit when they crystallize slightly. We have a wombtwin.com road show now! Book yours today!

I have a very interesting event taking place in central London next week.

FREE INFORMATION SESSION about a new project: wombtwin.com. Central London. 12-2pm September 13th plus lunch.

Given by myself, Althea Hayton and Nick Owen, directors of wombtwin.com, an organisation offering information, help and support to wombtwin survivors and their families.

One in eight people is a wombtwin survivor - that is, the sole survivor of a twin or multiple pregnancy. Many of these people may appear in therapy rooms and treatments room asking for help.

New research has shown that even when a twin is lost many months before birth, there is a body memory of the lost twin and a psychological effect on the survivor.

Pre and perinatal psychotherapists already maintain that experiences in the womb and around birth leave some kind of impression in the mind of the fetus that remains throughout life.

This deep impression can be disturbing and hard for the individual to understand until it is explained as prebirth experience and then it all make sense.

This is particularly hard for therapists of all kinds. If a wombtwin survivor comes to therapy for help there are few therapists who know how to work with them.

If the therapist is not aware that the loss of a twin before birth can leave an impression, both physically or mentally, then appropriate help cannot be offered.

If a wombtwin survivor is not aware that the loss of a twin may underlie their physical problems and psychological difficulties, they will not seek out the right help unless they know the signs.

I am an UnLtd award winner (National lottery millenium awards, see http://www.UnLtd.org.uk) and they are funding my first public event, among other things.

Visitors to this free event may include wombtwin survivors, parents who have lost a twin before birth psychotherapists and counsellors, psychologists, kinaesiologists, chirporactors - in fact anyone who is interested.

They can:
Watch an illustrated presentation, which will explain in detail the biology of early twin loss and how it can be proved

Listen to case studies of how wombtwin survivors have suffered and have been helped and healed

Learn about this condition, which is very common but rarely discussed in public.

Meet each other and swap stories

Buy my new book : "Untwinned: perspectives on the death of a twin before birth" at a reduced price

Join Wombtwin.com as a member

[PS And of course enjoy a free lunch ]

Entry by ticket only: Vsit the website for tickets [www.wombtwin.com]

So, here we are, back from Ghent, from an international conference. The organisation details here:

The conference venue was Ghent in Belgium: lovely place, here are the details of the conference.

I gave a talk about the results of my research, (delivered with several others under the general title of "controversies in obsterics") which went down like the proverbial lead balloon because I had not subjected my data to Multivariate Analysis of Covariance : silly me. I was told to find someone who would help me write the questionnaire questions and someone to help me create some kind of useful statistical analysis. The inference was that then and only then would anyone take me seriously......

The questionnaire is coming along nicely, it is now in its 6th generation and there are 30 already. As for the statistics, I found a psychologist with the necessary software who just happens to be an expert on vanishing twins and has undertaken the task and has all my research files which I just happened to have with me on my flash drive (hooray!) So watch this space for statistics to astonish the nation!

It makes me very sad that I have to spend so much time and energy convincing people of an obvious (and already statistically proven) fact, and that is that 10% of the population are the sole survivors of a twin or multiple pregnancy and the loss of their twin or multiple(s) DOES leave some kind of impression on the survivor.

I also learned that when you see a twin pair you may (or may not) be looking at a reduced triplet set, and there is no way of proving that either! In the light of this, the whole idea of using twins as research tools for testing genetic inheritance seems rather an uncertain science to me, against which my results are beginning to seem positively robust!

Well I never. Earlier this year, I dared to send an abstract about my analysis of the first 100 questionnnaires to the International Twin Conference, to be held this year in Ghent in June. You could have knocked me down with a feather when they replied last week that I can come and provide them with 15 minutes of my illustrious prose, sprinkled liberally of course with statistics. Wow.

So I'm analysing these data again (now there are 250 forms to do, thanks to 20 secs on ITN) and I need a statistician's help... (anyone out there want to help me?)

Wrestling with Powerpoint, boiling 5 years of work into 1500 words: that's the kind of thing now.

Not only that, but Ive been to Ireland and delivered a training session about the lost twin to some trainee psychotherapists at the Amethyst training centre. As far as we can see at present, 10 out of the 12 trainees are wombtwin survivors. They grasped the idea at once, but that may have been sheer enthusiasm for the idea. We'll see. We do know that wombtwin survivors are drawn to the healing and caring professions, so maybe that's not so surprising. What is more surprising however is that the vanished twin is lost in another way: there is very little written about the lost twin in the pre and perinatal psychology literature. Shirley Ward (Amethyst) and I will soon put that right. We are going to do a joint article entitled: "The lost twin - the missing link?"

And just to get me thoughly excited, I heard from Unltd that I am to be given a grant to create wombtwin.com, set up some more healing groups and organise a study day.

After 5 years, two of them spent closeted for fifty hours a week with my computer, living almost as a hermit, I can come blinking into daylight and speak about the inner lives of wombtwin survivors to an astonished and unbelieving world: but then that will be another story........