Being an identical twin comes with a pretty unique problem: other people don’t always know which one of the two they’re actually dealing with. Most of the time, that’s harmless enough. Sometimes, twins even use it to their advantage. Every now and then, though, it can become a bit awkward.
One Redditor asked people to share their most embarrassing experiences involving twins, and the answers did not disappoint. We’ve rounded up some of the funniest mix-ups and most uncomfortable misunderstandings below. Scroll down to check them out.
#1
Married the wrong one.
Image source: Namay_Hunt, Getty Images (not the actual photo)
#2
My mum’s a twin, I’ve caught her waving to mirrors in clothing stores a number of times thinking her sister is also there.
In my younger years, I’d often run to my auntie when I wanted to ask my mum something… Especially when she was at our house making coffee in the kitchen or something.
Image source: Nattyanaconda, Getty Images (not the actual photo)
#3
A guy I work with has a twin brother who lives across the country. He took a video or when he introduced his two year old son to his twin brother for the first time.
The moment that kid saw his uncle, his eyes just got huge and he kept looking back and forth. You could see his tiny brain explode and then he just started crying.
Image source: Manofthedecade, Getty Images (not the actual photo)
#4
My husband and his identical twin were wearing similar clothes and they look the SAME from behind: I hugged the wrong one. Awkward but in the end not a huge deal.
Image source: RissyMissy, Getty Images (not the actual photo)
#5
Dated an identical twin in college. At times, they suffered from what some call “Single Personality Sydrome”. They would do everything together, all decisions were made together. Even simple things. They would wake up in the morning and say “What are we wearing today?” Just giving some context for the story.
As I said, I dated this girl in college, her and her sister lived together. Now, the entire time we dated, her sister was single. This, more or less, made her sister the third wheel in EVERYTHING we did as a couple. It was like dating both of them without the perks of dating both of them (I know what you were thinking).
One time, the three of us went on a short 4 day cruise in the Caribbean. On the ship, we kind of all did our own thing. One morning, I got up and went to the gym and the girls went to breakfast. When I got back to the room I saw, who I thought was my gf, back in the bed. Thinking we had a brief moment of alone time, I climbed in the bed, spooned up behind her, started kissing her neck, and ran my hand up her shirt. She turns her head, and to my horror, I realize that it’s her sister and not my gf. I quickly backed away and said “OMG. I. Am. So. Sorry”. She took it like a champ. She shrugged, smiled, and said “It was bound to happen at some point.” She also alluded to the fact that this might have happened before with guys that came before me. As far as I know, she never told my gf, and I sure was not going to tell her.
Image source: AtlanticFit, Alena Darmel (not the actual photo)
#6
Not s twin myself, but my brother and I look a lot alike. To the point (when we were in or 20s) that people mistook is for each other. I was out visiting my brother and his wife. we were getting back from a day trip and his wife said she’s going to take a bath, in a way that it was obvious to me that she wanted him to join her. Well we go inside, I start emptying the car and taking stuff back into the kitchen when I hear my sister in law right behind me say, “So I guess I’m taking my bath alone” I just stand there trying not to laugh before answering “I think you have the wrong brother” she and i both burst out loud laughing. Still awkward, but it was funny.
Image source: Womple1703, Fritz dela Cruz (not the actual photo)
#7
He slept with my girlfriend. He later slept with the woman I thought I wanted to marry. We haven’t spoken in 5 years but he comes up in conversation a lot, like in awkward small talk when the clerk or the train ticket guy asks what brother I am and proceeds to ask how he is.
Image source: MrMcMeekin, Vitaly Gariev (not the actual photo)
#8
My grandad was an identical twin, he was in the irish army, his twin eddie was not in the army
Eddies daughter got a tattoo of eddie on her leg, its a big tattoo of him in his full army uniform, nobody has the heart to tell her its not her dad.
Image source: jeniwreni, Ziad Madkour (not the actual photo)
#9
I have twin uncles and one of their wives suggested to the other wife that they should switch beds that night and see if the twins noticed. The other wife looked at her and burst out laughing and had to explain that’s not how the look a like thing worked.
Image source: Tanaisy, Andrea Piacquadio (not the actual photo)
#10
My mother has an identical twin (my aunt obviously) so this is a story about my aunt’s spouse.
Apparently scent, among many other things, has a genetic component so an oddity we discovered in my childhood is that our family dog (a cute miniature schnauzer) was completely unable to tell my mother and my aunt apart. When my aunt would come over to visit, our dog would walk in the room, look back and forth between them and just whine for awhile. The world was apparently very confusing when there were two hooman mommies.
On the plus side, this meant when we went out of town we could just leave our dog with my aunt and the dog settled in perfectly happy. The location was strange, but hooman mommy was there so everything was all right. Right up until my uncle tried to get in bed with his wife. Then our dog would immediately growl, bark and try to drive away the intruder with all his (miniature) might.
My aunt thought it was hysterical but for some reason my uncle didn’t find this quite as funny…
Image source: Clapperoth, Gustavo Fring (not the actual photo)
#11
Oh my gosh…let me tell you. This is a long one, so please bear with me.
So, first off, I (almost) never mistake them. To me, they look completely different, and I know “mine” is the one with the attractively shaped head. However, maybe once or twice in the past, I got mixed up. The worst time happened in the school library freshman year of college.
I had been dating my guy, who we’ll call Brent, for four months. His identical twin, Ron, had been dating this girl Sarah for just a couple weeks. I’m walking into the library to meet Brent for dinner when I run into Sarah. We say hi, have a chat, and just as she’s turning to leave she mentions that she saw “my guy” in the second floor computer labs.
So I head up the stairs and see “Brent” sitting at one of the computers, when all of the sudden I’m hit with a revelation. Brent is not nearly as good looking as I remembered. I get a bit of a sinking feeling, and as I get closer, my fears are confirmed. I am no longer attracted to Brent. His skin seems more olive in hue, his haircut is strange, and his head is oddly asymmetric. Four months is a long time, and I figured the fire had died in me since I saw him last. But whatever, I tell myself to suck it up. Brent is a great guy, and I shouldn’t be so shallow. Looks aren’t everything, right?
Brent sees me and I give him a little wave, and he kind of just…stares back at me? Weird. I pull up a chair and start talking with him about his day, being all friendly and girl-friend like, but Brent is giving me nothing in return. All of his answers are short, and he seems almost confused by our interaction. He also doesn’t seem to remember that I had a big test that day (that I had been stressing about all month), because he didn’t even ask how it went. I start to get a little upset. Sure, I can handle dating a guy with a potato head, but not a guy who can’t engage with me socially. I figure maybe he’s having a bad day, so I ask if he wants to go for a walk around the library. He say, “uhhh, I guess, but that’s kind of weird.”
At that response I think *W*F, Brent! We’ve been dating for four months, this is not a weird thing to do together!* I decide I need a second to collect myself, because his behavior is really off-putting. I tell him I’m going to return a book on the first floor.
And so, I do what any girlfriend would do when she’s about to leave… I put my hand on his knee and kind of lean in for a kiss. Brent’s eyes go big and he starts slowly leaning away from me. I stop and have a second horrible revelation. In high school I dated a guy who happened to be gay (he didn’t really know it yet), but I figured it out when I went to kiss him and he leaned away from me. Just like Brent did. *Oh God.*
I am very flustered at this point, so I get up and immediately head down stairs. This is all just too much for me. In 10 minutes I went from dating a great man to having to break-up with a socially awkward (potentially gay) man with a misshapen head. I am lamenting my terrible position when I see Ron sitting in a chair on the first floor. He’s reclining with a book in his hand, leisurely leaning back and stretching out his long legs. A whispered thought crossed my mind. *Ron looks really good today.* I shake it off, and decided to talk with him. Maybe something happened to Brent that I don’t know about. Maybe Brent is upset about something, and that’s why he’s being so quiet. Or maybe he was hit in the head with a baseball, and that’s why his personality is different and the left side of his head is a little flatter than the right. Ron sees me and *enthusiastically* says hello.
Now, I don’t remember exactly what happened next, but we started talking. I remember thinking how much easier it was to talk with Ron, and wondering why Brent wasn’t like that. At some point I mention that Brent is on the second floor. Ron suddenly looks confused. He stops and says, “But I’m Brent!” I look at him and laugh. I think, *how can that possibly be? Ha ha ha!…wait…wait…oh my God*. That’s when I have my third horrible revelation.
I swear, what happened next was like a special effect in a movie. Ron’s face almost *transforms* in front of me. His cheek bones come into clearer focus, his eyes become rounder, peach-ness returns to his cheeks, and his forehead becomes a nicely formed rectangle. I think I had been mentally overlaying Ron’s features onto Brent’s face, allowing my eyes to trick my mind into believing the I was seeing what I thought I was seeing.
I realized that this “Ron” was actually my Brent, and that Sarah had mistakenly told me “my guy” was on the second floor. I started laughing, because I couldn’t believe what just happened. I told Brent all about the strange conversation I had with Ron, when I suddenly remembered that I had tried to kiss him. Ooops. I got up and ran to the second floor to see Ron. He was standing in the computer lab, bag in hand, ready to go on the most uncomfortable walk with his brother’s crazy girlfriend. Ron looked a little nervous and he said that he was willing to go on a walk with, but that he’d prefer to stay in the school’s library (presumably because there were many people who could help him if I tried any more moves). I laughed, and said, “I have a boyfriend,” and left*.
Anyway, Brent and I just got engaged, and I haven’t confused them since.
*Side Note: Ron and I are best friends, and I did eventually explain what happened. I like to mess with him though, because he’s technically Ron’s younger brother. Ron recently married my best-friend and college room-mate, and Brent and I were their best man and maid of honor. Ron and his wife will be the peeps of honor for our wedding as well.
TL;DR – Thought my boyfriend’s brother was my boyfriend. Had awkward conversation, found him unattractive, attempted romantic library-smooching, and questioned his sexuality. Then found real boyfriend. The end.
Image source: Konosa, Getty Images (not the actual photo)
#12
My wife and I found out that her identical twin was a exotic dancer when a bunch of my fraternity brothers went to the club and all started calling and texting me to ask if anything was wrong, and if I knew where my wife was.
Image source: luckyhunterdude, cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)
#13
Not a spouse but SO. Briefly dated a twin when I was in my early 20s. She lived with her sister.
I slept with the sister. Unknowingly. I was over, waiting for the GF to stop by, the sister let me in and then “Left”.
Well, she left, then came back, announcing she was my GF. Very early on into the relationship and we had a *very* good time. She left soon after because “work called, I had to go in”.
Needless to say, when my GF actually got home, I figured it out. Intercourse ensued again. I kept the secret.
We broke up soon after, unrelated, sister immediately started texting me.
So there’s that…
Image source: __PM_ME_BOOBIES, Kampus Production (not the actual photo)
#14
My boyfriend and his brother look insanely the same. His brother will walk around in the same slouchy position my boyfriend does when I come over, and all that really happens is I take a double take. Sometimes he poos with the doors open and I blame my boyfriend but its him.
Image source: lovelynaomi, Ahmed (not the actual photo)
#15
Not my most embarrassing moment but something close –
I frequent a bar every week. All the servers know me and know my husband – who doesn’t come every week but comes enough that our regular waitress knows who he is.
One evening husband’s identical twin brother and 8 month pregnant wife go to the bar for dinner. Cue several servers giving them some intense side eye and pretty terrible, downright rude service.
Brother-in-law says something like “huh, that’s weird, Twin always says they have the best service here, pretty sure IdleEmber comes every week” to his wife. His wife starts laughing and comments to the server “hey, I think you know my husband’s twin and his wife, they come here every week!”
The service greatly improved after that.
Image source: IdleEmber, Christin Noelle (not the actual photo)
#16
So my ex gf and her twin shared a place. I thought my ex was in the shower. The shower had opaque doors on it so you couldn’t really see who was inside the shower but you could still see a silhouette of a women that looked just like your girlfriend at the time. Anyway, I just got there to their home and had to use the bathroom. I rushed in, did a number 2 with all the bells and whistles. She slid open the shower door and said fsuizzy W*F are you doing. My jawed just dropped to the ground. I was speechless, thankfully I was done. Turns out my ex was in the backyard sitting by the pool.
Image source: fsuizzy, Yaroslav Shuraev (not the actual photo)
#17
I taught twins. I didnt notice I was teaching twins for a month. In my defence, I cant see faces well and everyone looks the same.
Image source: paperconservation101, Ron Lach (not the actual photo)
#18
In high school my BF was an identical twin. They’d do tricks at party’s, switch clothes ECT. It was funny if you knew the trick, or them, but everyone else was annoyed. One party me and BF’s twin’s GF decided to get them wrong on purpose. We agreed we’d just keep going, they’d hate it, they weren’t big on sharing at the best of times. We waited for the enevitable switch, and then went after the them.
For the first like minute, they played it as they were the other, until the GF and I started to hint at a little privacy ECT ECT…
They stopped with that trick after that.
Image source: phoenixjuliette, JEFFERSON SPYPLANE (not the actual photo)
#19
My mom is a twin and her poodle loves everyone. But she can’t stand my mom’s twin. Barks, growls, hides and bites. Only person she does this with. And my Aunt is a dog person. Dogs love her.
Image source: ZuZuXO, Ngân Dương (not the actual photo)
#20
Not me but someone I knew said that they have a back massage to their wife’s triplet and then kissed her on the ear.
Image source: MarshmallowPenguin2, Yan Krukau (not the actual photo)
#21
My husband doesn’t have a twin, but we were at a friend’s wedding and we were standing around and talking to a few people. This part is important: my husband is 6’0″ and I am 5’0″. At this point, we had a few beers and were feeling good.
Out of habit, I leaned over and put my arm around my husband’s back, and leaned up against him. My husband jumped back, and it was then I realized that my husband had left the circle minutes ago and I had just hugged a different tall man.
I’ve now learned to look up and make sure my husband is next to me before caressing his back.
Image source: Tinyasparagus, Rickson Bejar (not the actual photo)
#22
Once I got greeted by a guy who mistook me with one of his friends.
Then I met the friend. We’ve been calling each other “brother” ever since.
Image source: CaptainGilliam, Dhemer Gonçalves (not the actual photo)
#23
I don’t know if this counts, but my ex forgot her twin sister’s birthday. I was quite impressed.
Image source: bartefaen, cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)
#24
When I’m over his house, I have to be *very* sure when I approach him from behind to hug him that I have the right one. From the back you just can’t tell lol.
Image source: purple_sphinx, Gustavo Fring (not the actual photo)
#25
I got identical twin brothers. They were arguing and one called the other jerkface. It was funny after he realized they look the same.
Image source: anon, Jenum (not the actual photo)
#26
My father is a twin. My mother has gotten dirty looks from strangers that know my uncle but not that he and my father are twins, thinking that we were some secret family. My aunt has attested to it happening to her as well. That’s about it. It’s pretty funny.
My kids both kinda had their brains explode when they met my uncle for the first time.
Image source: Gonzostewie, Nataliya Vaitkevich (not the actual photo)
#27
When I was in highschool I was dating a girl who had an identical twin. The girl I dated went to public school, the twin however went to a smaller school.
Every once in a while they would swap places. Well, I wasn’t informed of when it was happening. Imagine my surprise when I hopped in my girlfriends car in the morning, leaned over to kiss her and BOOM! It’s the sister!
Image source: Snortallthethings, Derek Dolro (not the actual photo)
#28
My sister’s husband is not a twin but him and his brother could pass as twins. She said when they first got together she walked into the kitchen and smacked his brothers bum thinking it was him.
Image source: Molly_Connolly69, Thirdman (not the actual photo)
#29
Posted it before, my ex-wife’s sister stayed with us for a few months and for some reason liked to use our bathroom in the morning to get ready. One morning I walked in thinking it was my wife, lifted the towel she had wrapped around her and smacked her bum.
It wasn’t my wife.
Image source: p4lm3r, Yan Krukau (not the actual photo)
#30
Not me, but my uncle and father.
They were playing tag and my father was running from my uncle. My father came across a mirror and ran for his life thinking that was his brother, my uncle.
They have the best of stories but this is the only one I remember.
Image source: anon, Alberto Morales (not the actual photo)
#31
My next-oldest sister was not my twin, but were often mistaken for twins. She was home from boot camp and I was getting ready for a date with my boyfriend. She was doing the bathrobe/big bowl of ice cream thing in the kitchen. My boyfriend arrived, I opened the window of my bedroom and told him to come in. I was almost ready. I am upstairs in my bedroom and I hear her yelling and beating on someone.
She’d been away. She’d never met my boyfriend. He thought it was me in the kitchen. He said “oooh, you aren’t dressed yet” and reached from behind and put his hands on her bum. She thought she was being attacked and started screaming and hitting him and throwing things at him. She’d learned some skills in boot camp. I ran downstairs and she shouted for me to call the police and he was cowering in the corner of the kitchen trying to explain.
tl;dr: my boyfriend thought my sister was me and ended up getting a beat down of epic proportions.
Image source: loridee
#32
Not me but my neighbors. A set of identical twin guys married a set of identical twin gals. Not kidding. Kinda creepy actually. But one time they were going out on dates and both sets of twins decided to prank the other and switch (at the time they hadn’t been dating long but they are now married) and anyways they ended up being with the right ones but didn’t really know it for an hour or so. Lol.
Image source: i_choose_rem
#33
I dated a twin in high school. It was a strange situation, because the one I wasn’t dating happened to be a huge s**t and my gf was the complete opposite. As things were going south with my gf, the sl*tty one started moving in on me. It finally climaxed at a party one night.
I broke up with the gf a few days before, but it just so happens that I see one of them at the party. She comes up to me and says she wants to talk, so I assumed it was my ex. Takes me into a bedroom, tells me that she wants to lose her virginity and that even though we broke up, she wants it to be me. She then proceeds to have the most un-virgin wild s*x my teenage mind had ever seen. I mean, she f****d the living s**t out of me.
Then, as we’re laying in bed, the ex knocks on the door. I answer the door and she immediately starts crying and runs away. I look back at the bed, and instead of the twin I had slept with, there was a giant amphibian from the paleolithic era. It turns to me and says “Can I have bout treefiddy?”.
Image source: anon
#34
Early on when dating my wife and mee her sister for the first time they were wearing similar outfits, as we were leaving my house I turned around to lock the door, then caught up and spanked the wrong sister…quickly realized what I had done and apologized profusely…still get s**t about it to this day ten years later.
Image source: Sfgiants420
#35
I worked with a set of identical twins for about 3 months before I knew there were 2 of them. They did look VERY identical and we all worked in the field which meant we were all wearing matching uniforms.
I’d need to be at the office usually once or twice a week max. I’d seen Donnie talking to another guy so I knew his name was Donnie but hadn’t actually worked with him directly yet. Later I did in fact work with Ronnie. I just assumed I’d heard his name wrong. Then one day at the office I walked in and Donnie and Ronnie were both there standing next to each other. Caught me off guard a bit.
Image source: sharrrp
#36
Not identical twins but a look-a-like. My aunt had just gotten married and they’d stopped at a hotel for their honeymoon. Well, they were in the lobby and she saw her husband facing the other way and she went up behind him and hugged him and whispered “Don’t you think it’s about time we went to the room?” In a really seductive manner. Guy turns around, not her husband. Awko taco.
Image source: anon
#37
Not me but my dad, on the day they met he got some time alone with her and they started to kiss. After that he wanted to do a sort of compliment about how he he got together with my mom, but instead of saying: who would’ve thought I’d end up making out with C, He said my aunts name. They’ve been together for 29 years now so it all worked out.
Image source: teunskill
#38
My husband is a twin (they are mirror, not identical), but he and his brother look and sound very different to me.
They look similar enough that my dad and other people can’t tell them apart because they don’t like to be in the same place at the same time so they are rarely side by side to compare.
I worked in the same department as my brother in law (got him hired after I married his brother). My boss for the longest time would get mad at my bil for showing up in jeans (that was my husband), coworkers would get really confused when they saw my husband and my brother in law on different sides of the building, that sort of thing.
Most embarrassing for me? Being asked if I’d ever had a t*******e with them both. I get that question a lot.
Image source: paradoxofpurple
#39
A bit late to party but a bit of a double whammy for me.
Me and my brother sound the same, even our mom could not tell us apart. Let’s call us A and B.
In our school days I had a friend whose big brother also used to be my big brothers friend. Let’s call them X and Y.
A is friend with X and B is friend with Y.
What we didn’t realize is that those two brothers also sound quite the same.
Cue the old rotary phones. X calls looking for me, A. B answer the phone. X recognized the voice as A. B also recognize the voice of X as Y.
They both chats and makes up important plans about when and where to met.
It was really awkward when my big brother showed up to hang around with my friends without me.
Image source: My1stTW
#40
Dating a twin, they live together and will often just fall asleep in random places around their home. I went into my boyfriend’s room and saw his figure asleep- same hair, shape, etc.- and crawled on in to wake him up. Needless to say, it was the twin and he laughed really hard about the whole situation whereas I was horrified. This was near the early parts of the relationship so it was more embarrassing than it would be today… haha.
Image source: rufusmaru
#41
Semirelated. I have a fantasy style p***o idea called “Dopplegangbangers”. It would be a real money maker.
Image source: radrobgray
#42
When I was in high school, I started dating a guy. I saw him in the hallway one time, and ran up and gave him a hug. He responded with, “um… Hey?” Then the guy I was actually dating walked up to us. That’s how I found out he had a twin.
Image source: CaroDactyl_noms
#43
Not a twin. But I took a scuba diving course with 8 other people, all strangers to me. 2 were a couple, and the girl looked nothing like me by face, but we had similar hair and similar body shapes. We were wet suits to dive, so then we were all wearing the same thing! While standing on the boat looking out over the water, the boyfriend came up behind me, put his arm around me, and came in to kiss my face. Then when he saw my face stopped suddenly and apologized and we started laughing. He said don’t tell Emily I did that!
There was an upside to us looking alike. We have a dvd of our dives, and with the masks on we look the same, so it looks like we each have double the camera time!
Image source: firefannie
#44
I had two girls with an identical twin, when we broke up he requested dna tests. Both came back as his, but the younger daughter was only a 99.98% match. He swears his twin brother must be the father. I never touched his brother.
Image source: Pretigee
#45
Arrived at my girlfriends house, she was doing some gardening with her headphones in, I thought it would be a good idea to sneak up on her, spin her round and plant one on her. Kissed her, her eyes widened, she pulled away.. It wasn’t my girlfriend, it was her twin sister. Turns out my girlfriend set it up, she told me she was home alone, doing gardening. She watch from the window expecting to see me have a awkward conversation with her sister, didn’t actually expect me to kiss her. Girlfriend laughed about it, her sister didn’t.. Left it pretty awkward between me and her sister.
Image source: TusShona
#46
Not twins, but my gf and her oldest sister look a lot alike. They decided to wear the same Halloween outfit at their cousin’s party. He bought a huge ice luge for shots.
I walked up behind her sister and whispered in her ear, “So who’s doing the luge?”. It was super funny and every now and then she’ll do this to me.
Image source: Iefthandofgod
#47
The question is, did something naughty happen between you and the Twin?
Image source: anon
#48
My sister and I are a year apart, but we seem to have identical voices ( we can tell us apart, but no one else can) and move the same. I walked into her house and was doing stuff in her kitchen. Her husband was busy in another room and yelled over that we should “Go upstairs for some s**y times before your sister gets here.” I politely declined. My sister and I thought it was hysterical. Brother-in-law was horrified and embarassed for ages.
Image source: 2beagles
#49
I made really quick friends with a guy in 7th grade at art school. We hung out all the time and I knew he had 2 brothers who went to the regular high school in the district so I never met them. About 8 months into our friendship I was invited to his Mitzvah. I told him I always forget which one is for boys or girls Bar Mitzvah or Bat Mitzvah. He said Bar for boys, Bat for girls but his would be a B’nai Mitzvah for him and his twin.
I knew him for almost year before learning one of his brothers was a twin.
Image source: Caliblair
#50
My moms an identical twin.
When I was a baby I would start crying when I couldn’t tell which twin was my mom.
Image source: diddlyding
#51
Not a spouse, but I am an identical twin!
My sister and I like to mess with my boyfriend sometimes, like for example I’ll be holding his hand and while he’s not paying attention I’ll switch my hand to my sisters and see how long it takes him to notice. It gives my friends and his friends a good laugh.
This one time, I was off getting lunch or something and my sister comes over to his table since her friends sit there as well, and he hugs her from behind. Eventually he realizes it’s not me, but he just plays along with it out of embarrassment. I was kinda mad at first but I just laughed it off and to be fair, she was wearing my jacket so it wasn’t his fault entirely. We still laugh about it!
Image source: mrdanneh
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