Wednesday, November 7, 2012

It's sad been a twin when......

Forewarned this post is a rant.

I'm a little bit wound up right now. Why? Let me tell you why? If you are a parent of multiples you may completely understand this.....

You would like your children to attend a group class, like swimming or those toddler classes, you know those group classes where the parent - child attends. There maybe singing, dancing, or other body moving/learning activities and a professionally trained instructor/teacher. You pick up the phone to make enquiries and you find out it is strictly one child to one adult. Your husband works, your nearest family is a 4.5 hour drive away. Eeryone you know is working or has their own children they are caring for. You slowly realise your multiples will miss out on this opportunity.

Apart of me (and it's very tiny) understands, but it saddens me that their twinness combined with a set of circumstances will mean that they are excluded from participating in certain activities.

To the helpful lady who answered the phone, did it ever occur to you that you have NEVER had twins attend because your establishment's system, processes, lack of ability to think outside of the box, excludes twins/multiples from participating? Did you feel embarassed when I said as much to you? I felt embarrased for you when you could not clearly articulate the one child to one adult policy "Because it's always been this way," is NOT an acceptable answer.

If you are attending a class which involves one child to one parent..... take a look around. Any twins there? No? Perhaps this is why.

Rant over. Thanks for reading.

1 comment:

  1. I feel your pain. I have family close but due to their own commitments they are unable to be the second adult. I asked about swimming lessons and was told it would be unfair to have them both in the class. It's also unfair that they haven't yet had swimming lessons and by this age their brother had been attending for almost two years. They miss out on things already because of the extra time and effort it takes to do things that it's extra sad that policies like this mean they are even less likely to get those experiences.

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