As twins, Gail Staal and Tal Schwartz grew up sharing a home, a closet and even a wardrobe.
“Twins learn to share but don’t find out what makes them whole,” Schwartz said. “They get labeled as children and define themselves against one another.”
Staal and Schwartz savored the chance in early adulthood to strike out and lead separate lives. But recent losses have brought them, now in their 60’s, back together in Manhasset.
The two lead the Twin Project, an initiative that aims to raise awareness about the particular hardships endured and joys relished by twins.
As opposed to “Donald Trump’s politics of dividing people, twins experience a shared sense of humanity,” Schwartz said.
More twins are born in the United States than ever before, with 33.9 twins born for every 1,000 births in 2014, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Though they’ve come to share pride in their unique relationship, Staal and Schwartz traveled divergent paths to their reunion.
“I traveled in a VW bus across the country,” Staal said of the moment she left home and her twin sister in Malverne in 1974, at age 19, for Tucson, Arizona. “I was seeking spiritual community and teachings in meditation and yoga.” She was a self-described hippie.
Schwartz left Long Island soon after, settling in Tucson as well, she said. They lived in separate homes in Tucson for five years before Staal moved elsewhere in the Southwest.
“For several decades we lived very separate lives,” Staal said. Though they did not see much of each other in those years, Staal and Schwartz both pursued vocations in therapy, they said. Staal is a clinical social worker trained in Gestalt and somatic trauma healing, while Schwartz is a licensed acupuncturist and kinesiologist.
In addition to pursuing their work, Staal and Schwartz married and started families of their own. Eventually both moved back East, as Staal settled in Manhasset and Schwartz in Montclair, New Jersey.
Then, in 2012, Schwartz’s husband, Herb Schwartz, died of lung cancer after a two-year fight with the disease. The ailment had struck when Herb was experiencing success as an artist. Only a decade before the diagnosis, he had served as a White House artist during the Clinton administration.
Just four months after Herb’s death, Tal Schwartz experienced another loss: her son, Josh Ilutzi, died in a motorcycle accident at age 36.
“It was devastating,” Schwartz said. “I needed support and I didn’t want to blame myself. I could not have made it through without my sister to witness me, one day at a time.”
Schwartz’s daughter, Sabrina Mann, also helped her through those difficult times.
That same year, Staal’s 89-year-old husband, Murray Staal, died of complications of old age. “My husband’s death was more expected because of his age,” Staal said. “But it was still difficult.”
After his death, Staal was living alone at the home in Manhasset she had shared wtih her husband. Schwartz was living alone in Montclair. Staal asked Schwartz if she would like to come stay in Manhasset, and the two have lived together ever since.
“Going through deaths keeps us aware that it’s a gift right now that we’re together and above ground,” Staal said.
Both of them operate private therapy practices in offices that adjoin their home. “We share many patients,” Staal said. She explained that some go to Schwartz for acupuncture and then have a session of talk therapy with Staal directly afterward.
For years, Staal has worked with patients in Port Washington, some of whom have moved elsewhere to places like California or England, where they call her for sessions over the phone. In 2013, a few of her patients in Japan invited her and Schwartz to hold workshops on how to cope with stress. They spent three weeks with expatriates in Tokyo, Kyoto and Hakomi.
Schwartz and Staal considered the collaboration the first initiative of their Twin Project, an organization they founded shortly thereafter to share their story and their therapeutic expertise with others. Their next event is a lecture at the Shelter Rock Public Library this summer.
“We’ve learned that as we move out into the world we can help others and ourselves,” Staal said.
