The twins brought up on either side of the Iron Curtain... but who lived identical lives

The twins brought up on either side of the Iron Curtain... but who lived identical lives

By BECKY SHEAVES



When Conny Holzbrecher was a little girl, she had a much-loved doll that accompanied her everywhere - to school, to friends' houses, to bed at night.



But when people asked what the doll' s name was, she always gave the same enigmatic answer: " She hasn' t got a name. She' s just my sister."



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Devoted sisters: Twins Ulrike Reichenbach (left) and Conny Holzbrecher were reunited only after the fall of the Berlin Wall





At the time, her parents thought her behaviour was a reaction to being an only child. And, because she had been adopted by an infertile couple, there was little they could do to help her.





" But I always had that feeling, deep in my soul, that there was something missing from my life or my family. I was trying to reach out, to connect with someone," says Conny, now 38.





" Somehow I always felt an underlying sense of loss."





And, astonishingly, she was right. For Conny was not an only child - she had an identical twin sister, living hundreds of miles away.



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Thanks to a cruel twist of fate, the two were separated as babies, and remained so for 26 years.





Today, Conny is reunited with her identical sister, Ulrike Reichenbach.





They wear similar clothes, identical make-up, have the same hairstyles and even complete each other' s sentences.





It' s impossible to believe that, for the first two-thirds of their lives, they were apart. But theirs is an extraordinary tale of loss and reunion, now published in a moving book they have co-written.





Their story casts intriguing light on the endless debate over whether nature or nurture has a greater hold over our characters.





In short, Ulrike and Conny are hauntingly similar, not just in looks, but also in demeanour, tastes, sense of humour and outlook.





But there is one more twist to their extraordinary story. For they were adopted by two very different families and ended up living on either side of the Berlin Wall.





Ulrike was raised in affluent West Germany with every modern luxury and freedom, while Conny grew up amid the deprivation of the communist East.





Despite this, both twins had their appendixes removed at 16, both had their first child at 19, and both have the same career - event management. And yet they did not meet until they were adults and mothers themselves.