NATIONAL TWIN DAY: Odds of Being a Twin are Slim in Wyoming

The odds of having a twin in Wyoming are not high. In fact, Wyoming ranks somewhere in the middle when it comes to having twins out of all 50 states, but strangely ranks second for the state with the most triplets!

Sorry triplets, you and your wombmates can celebrate National Triplet Day on March 3.

This study was done by gambling.com and it simply looks at the number of births in every state to see how many out of 1,000 included twins. These ranged from the top ranked state (Michigan) with 3.58% to the bottom (New Mexico) with 2.52%. The other 48 lie somewhere in the middle, so we're not talking about a huge range here. It seems the odds of having twins in general is pretty low.

Further, the odds of fraternal twins is 2/3 of that already low number, and 1/3 are identical.

I happen to be an identical twin myself, which has come in handy more than once but caused a great deal of confusion to many a teacher growing up. An older cousin once brought us to their class for show-and-tell. My mother dressed us in matching dresses and did our hair the same -- ringlets with enormous, teased bangs sprayed stiff.

It's funny because every time either of us has been pregnant people are quick to go, "It's probably going to be twins," but according to the National Health Center, identical twins do not run in families nor do they skip a generation. There are, however, factors that make having fraternal twins more likely: they are more common in ethnic groups, with the highest rate among Nigerians and the lowest among Japanese.

Also, you're more likely to have fraternal twins if you are over 35 during pregnancy because you're more likely to release more than 1 egg during ovulation.

IVF can increase the chance of twins as more than one embryo may be transferred. And some evidence suggests that fraternal twins run on the mother's side of the family, probably because of the inherited tendency to release more than one egg.

This morning I looked into some more mythos surrounding twins and learned that twins do not have the same DNA (but it's 99.9999999....% the same, so). On that note, their fingerprints are not the same.

A 2011 study found that women who naturally conceived and gave birth to twins had a lower risk of dying each year after age 50 than those who had just one baby at a time. Researchers think this is just an indicator of innate healthiness that made them able to conceive, carry and deliver twins in the first place.

As far as ESP? If it's a thing, me and mine haven't tapped into it yet but I'm not ruling it out. Being so close for our whole lives I can definitely sense things about her that nobody else can. "It's a twin thing" - (Gru, Despicable me).