How do I lose my "shadows"?

[lisa928]

My twin girls will turn four in November. Within the last month or two it seems they have gotten much more clingy. What I mean by that is as I walk around the house doing things they are like little shadows. The follow me everywhere! Sometimes I even walk in circles on purpose and they still follow me. Even when I go downstairs to just grab the laundry they follow me. For the times they cannot follow me (say they are sitting at the table having lunch) and walk out of the room they are yelling, “are you going to be right back?”. They go to daycare/preschool (and have since 4 months) so I would have never have expected this anxiety. Over the weekend as I was doing things around the house I told them they needed to stop following me and go into the playroom or I was going to lock myself in the bathroom!

Is this a phase? Any suggests for losing my shadows, beyond waiting for the sun to go down and they do to bed?! :)

[AJP]

Lol. Sorry to laugh, but I have the same thing going on here! I've even done the walk in a circle thing. If they don't follow me around they're climbing into cabinets or hunting down permanent markers. They alway "neeeeed" me half a second after I leave the room. It seems to be a stage with my DD's because they werent this bad 6 months ago. You would think with two of them they'd be happy following eachother around.
I have no answers. Just wanted to tell you you're not alone!

[twowhat?]

I had to LOL at the walking in a circle thing. Such a funny mental image. My girls had separation anxiety pretty much from birth until 3.5 or 3.75. When we're out they will follow me like ducklings but in the house they (FINALLY...I mean, FINALLY) will go play on their own. This is such a recent thing that I often am at a loss of what to do when they're not clinging to me.

Were your girls anxious/have a lot of separation anxiety when they were younger? If not maybe they're just making up for it now?

And have you tried asking them? "Why do you always follow Mommy around?" Maybe the answer will give some insights (maybe they heard something scary at school or something) and you can address it then:) Good luck!