Lupita and Carmen, who are conjoined twins, say they don’t think of themselves as crippled and that disability is just a way of thinking. When they were born in 2002, the sisters were told they only had three days to live. Even though they were told that being separated could kill them or take a lot of medical care, they chose to stay joined. Since then, they have learned how to handle life together well, even though Carmen now has a boyfriend.
Doctors didn’t think they would make it when they were born.
The twin sisters, Carmen (left) and Lupita (right) Andrade, have a close bond. They were born in Mexico in 2002. From the chest to the pelvis, they were united. At first, experts told them that they only had three days to live. Experts in medicine thought that separating them would pose a lot of risks because their organs and lower spines were so complicated and shared.
But they also chose to do it.
When asked if they wanted to have separation surgery, both Carmen and Lupita said no. They said that even if the surgery went well, the long-term physical rehab that would follow would be difficult. Carmen added, “There’s also the psychological situation, since we’re so used to being together,” she said. “I don’t think there’d be any point.”
Too many of their important organs are the same.
Lupita and Carmen asked their mother a very important question when the subject of separation surgery came up: “Why would you want to cut us in half?” The sisters have lived in Connecticut since they were 2 years old. Their chest walls are joined, and their link goes all the way down to where their spines meet in the pelvis. Carmen controls the right leg of both of them, while Lupita controls the left leg of both of them. Each of them has two arms.
Even though they are joined twins, they think and want different things.
In a recent conversation, Carmen and Lupita answered questions people often ask them about being joined at the hip. They talk about how they handle everyday things like driving and dating, as well as how they choose what to wear and who to be friends with. Also, they talked about how their relationship works, including how they deal with arguments and sometimes getting annoyed with each other.
Carmen and Lupita both want to work in the veterinary field, but their goals are different. Carmen wants to be a veterinary nurse, while Lupita wants to be a worker.
Lupita doesn’t like men or women, but Carmen does.
The girls have also had problems with the men they like. Lupita says she is asexual, and Carmen used a dating app a few years ago to try online dating for the first time. But she said that when she put that she was a conjoined twin on her page, she got a lot of messages from people with fetishes. Carmen also said that she has trouble opening up to new people because she has social nervousness.
In October 2020, Carmen and Daniel met on the app, and they hit it off right away. Daniel was different from other people because he didn’t ask her right away about her condition, which hurt her greatly.
“We’ve been together for two and a half years now, and we’ve even talked about getting engaged,” she said with excitement. “But first we want to live with each other.”
Being in a relationship as a conjoined twin has its difficulties, but Carmen said that Daniel and Lupita, who is also her sister, get along very well. Sometimes, they’ll keep talking even after she’s asleep. Lupita said jokingly about her sister’s relationship, “I make fun of both of them.”
Carmen also said that when she goes on dates with Daniel, she tries to find solutions that are fair for Lupita, who is always there. So that Lupita feels included and important in the relationship, she lets her choose where they eat and what they do together.
They understand how each other feels and have the same group of friends.
They talked about how they’ve always had the same group of friends. Carmen said, “Lupita has a great intuition about people, so if she likes them, I like them too.” They want to make the lives of conjoined twins more normal by telling the truth about their story. “You have to remember: we’re not just conjoined twins, we’re people,” Carmen said.
The sisters also talked about how they share a special mental bond and can often feel each other’s feelings. Carmen told Lupita about a time when she felt uncomfortable because a man was filming them in a store. Lupita said, “I can tell when Carmen is worried or about to cry. It’s the same feeling in your stomach.”