ABSTRACT
The death of a twin during pregnancy or around birth gives rise to a bewildering confusion of thoughts and feelings that can impede mourning and disturb the bereaved mother’s care of a surviving twin. Photographs especially can reduce confusion and assist reality testing and thus facilitate the grieving process and improve the care of the surviving twin. Twins are often premature and often surrounded by medical paraphernalia, and therefore they look unusual to parents. Many parents treasure photographs of their dead baby, which can facilitate the testing of reality, create memories, and help sort out confusion between the live and the dead twin. A mother who has had a multiple pregnancy continues to think of herself as a mother of twins. Vagueness can be more troublesome to the surviving twin than a proper knowledge of the lost foetus. Surviving twins have in any case to come to terms with their unease about survival and identity.
