Rewinding the years helped Yvonne Green, 49, move forward with her life
WORDS: FRANCESCA WOODSTOCK. BEFORE PHOTO: ANNA MEDICAL AESTHETICS IN SWINDON. TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT ELLANSE AND ITS COLLAGEN-STIMULATING EFFECTS, VISIT ELLANSE.COM
Hearing the phone ring, I jumped off the sofa and grabbed it. ‘Angie!’ I said, delighted to hear from my twin sister. It was February 2018, and my sister and I spoke on the phone every day. She lived thousands of miles away in South Africa, but I only had to look in the mirror to see her face. We looked exactly the same.
Angie and I were so close. As kids, we spent hours playing with our dolls, and we loved dressing in matching outfits.
In 1984, aged 12, we moved from the UK to South Africa, but having a twin was like having a ready-made best friend. We shared everything from sweets to secrets, and although we were non-identical, everyone struggled to tell us apart.
In 2001, aged 29, I moved back to the UK, and Angie stayed in South Africa. We both had children and our own lives, but nothing could separate our bond. I visited whenever I could, but by 2018, I hadn’t seen Angie in person for five years, so our daily chats were more important than ever.
‘Catch up tomorrow,’ I told her, hanging up the phone, and before I got in bed, I texted to say goodnight. Love you, she wrote back. But waking at 6am the next morning, I was unable to move - I felt pinned to the bed by an unbearable weight.
Within an hour, the phone rang, and a feeling of dread washed over me. I knew something had happened to my sister.
HEARTBROKEN
‘I’m sorry, Yvonne,’ I heard my nephew say. My heart sank. I just knew my sister was dead.
He told me Angie had died suddenly and unexpectedly from a heart attack. My daughter, Chloe, then 14, heard me sobbing and rushed in to find me on the floor.
Losing Angie felt like I had half died myself. I felt so fragile I couldn’t even travel to South Africa for her funeral, which was heartbreaking. Instead, Chloe and her sister Jess, 18, got me a candle with my sister’s name on it and we bought flowers to remember her by. ‘She’ll always be part of you, Mum,’ Chloe told me.
But when I looked in the mirror, I no longer saw my sister. I only saw grief and sadness.
TRAGIC TIMES
My eyes looked sunken, and deep wrinkles had appeared overnight. I’d look at photos of me and Angie dressed in matching outfits as little girls, trying to recapture happy memories. But those days were gone. I felt old, and there was a sense of guilt for having outlived my twin.
My dad was my rock. ‘You
