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Sometimes after kids have grown up, parents drop a bombshell on them, feeling like they are mature enough to handle some kind of shocking news. Moms and dads might reveal that they're getting a divorce or that their child is adopted, but what Anna Hipkin's parents revealed to her has left her surprised and confused.
In a video on TikTok, 19-year-old Anna states that she just learned her brother is actually her twin - which isn't too crazy... until you learn that her sibling is five years younger than her. She wrote on her post, "When you casually get told over lunch by your divorced parents that your 13-year-old brother is actually your twin, but you're 19."
Without much context, commenters had no idea what she meant, but in a follow-up video, Anna explained what was going on. She described that she was conceived through IVF, and that her brother was also conceived during that same round of treatment. However, rather than be pregnant with twins, her mom chose to just have one baby and freeze the other embryo. As Anna said, "Basically, we were both conceived in a dish, and then I was put back in my mom, and then my brother was put in the freezer for five years as an embryo."
Anna added, "It got to five years of Jack being in the freezer and they were like, "We'll defrost him.' Fair play to them. They defrosted him, put him back in my mum, and then nine months later, there you go. So there are five years between us, I'm 19 and he's 13, nearly 14. Obviously, we're not identical twins, but biologically, technically, we are twins."
Commenters disagree. One wrote, "If you go by that logic, all siblings are twins as long as they have the same parents," and, "How is he your twin?! That's not how it works. He's not your twin!" and, "Huh? That doesn't make him your twin though. You have the same relationship as any other siblings. Twins are conceived and carried at the same time."
Others, however, related similar stories. Someone wrote, "One of my friends is the same. Their parents did IVF and had my friend, and then had her twin 10 years later."
As for the science behind it, according to research by fertility doctors per the Daily Mirror, women pregnant with embryos that were frozen tend to have fewer complications than those with fresh fetuses implanted through IVF.