I found my twin after 40 years
L-r: Gwen, Stan, me and Randy reunite for our 76th birthday
Monday 11th June 2007
It was my 69th birthday, but all I felt like doing was crying. I gazed down at the faded black and white photo… two little girls with blonde ringlets wearing matching checked dresses smiled back at me.
'Oh, Gwen,' I sighed, stroking the image on the right. 'Where are you?'
It seemed like only yesterday my identical twin, Gwen, and I had posed for that picture in the photographer's studio in Battersea, South London. But we were just 7 years old. Now, more than 40 years had passed since I'd last seen or spoken to her.
Growing up, Gwen and I had been inseparable. We'd dressed alike, even thought the same things. At school, our teachers made us wear badges as only our parents, Ivy and Arthur Skinner, could tell us apart. At 17, I married my childhood sweetheart, Stan, and a couple
of years later, Gwen married Tony, a local lad. We only lived a few streets apart, even got jobs at the same branch of Woolworths in Clapham Junction.
Then, when we were 26, Gwen dropped a bombshell.
'Tony wants a change of scene,' she told me. 'He wants us to go and live in the US.'
My face dropped.
'B-but what will I do without you?' I stuttered.
A few weeks later, I stood on the dock at Liverpool hugging Gwen.
'You'd better write,' I sobbed.
'Try and stop me,' she said, her voice choked with emotion.
Minutes later, she and Tony disappeared up the gangplank. It felt like my right arm had been cut off.
True to her word, Gwen wrote regularly, telling me all about her new life in Los Angeles. But suddenly, one Christmas two years later, the letters stopped. Then the Christmas card I'd sent to Gwen was returned unopened. 'Not known at this address', read the message on the envelope. I didn't know what to do.
I sent more letters, but they were returned unopened, too. In those days, we didn't have
a phone, and there was no email or internet. After we had our children, Susan, now 55, and Sandra, now 41, Stan and I moved to Streatham, South London, then Hastings, East Sussex.
The years went by, but I never stopped thinking about Gwen.
'I know she's alive,' I said to Stan that night. 'She'll find me one day.'
Then one day, I was doing the washing-up when the phone rang.
'Is that Jean?' a voice said.
I stopped dead in my tracks. It sounded just like me. It couldn't be, could it?
'Oh my God,' I gasped, bursting into tears. 'Is that you Gwen?'
'Yes,' she laughed.
My sister was alive and well.
There were so many things I wanted to ask.
'Where did you go?' I gabbled. 'How did you find me?'
'I always wanted to, but we moved around so much that by the time I got in contact, you'd moved on, too,' Gwen explained. 'But I never stopped thinking about you.'
Gwen had two daughters, Janet, 52, and Deborah, 40. Deborah had gone on the internet and found an agency who searched for missing people. A couple of months later, they'd found my address.
'There's so much to talk about,' I smiled, as Gwen described how she'd split up with Tony after 10 years and was now married to an American, Randy Jones, 73.
Two months later, I stood at Heathrow Airport waiting to meet my sister again for the first time since we were 26. Suddenly, a lady with shoulder-length blonde hair and glasses stepped through the gate. It was like looking in a mirror. After all that time, Gwen and I still looked the same. We were even wearing similar jeans and pink jumpers.
'Come and give your twin a hug,' Gwen cried, flinging her arms round me.
The next three weeks were brilliant. We spent the whole time talking, trying to catch up on all the lost years. Since Gwen's visit, we talk on the phone at least once a week. Then in April this year, Gwen came back over to the UK for our 76th birthday. At last, with my twin by my side, I finally felt like celebrating.
I'm so glad Gwen's back in my life. We're like two peas in a pod, and nothing — not even
the Atlantic Ocean — will ever come between us again. My right arm is firmly back where it belongs!
Read other heartwarming stories from Pick Me Up:
Battle of the babies
Harvey's showing us the way