By Rachel Paula Abrahamson -
NBC Today
Lupita and Carmen Andrade are 22-year-old conjoined sisters who came to the United States from Mexico as babies and now live in Connecticut.
The two women are joined at the torso and share the pelvis and reproductive system.
Each has two arms, but only one leg.
As Carmen controls the right leg, she leads, she told TODAY.com.
Lupita is in charge of music and navigation.
Together they make the perfect team.
Lupita and Carmen, 22-year-old conjoined twins living in Connecticut.TODAY
Carmen is studying veterinary nursing at the university, and Lupita hopes to work in the same field as a technician.
Lupita also dreams of being a comedy writer.
“I am the one who talks the most, but she is funnier”
, explains Carmen.
Here are 7 things they want people to know about conjoined twins:
"We have dates... well, Carmen has"
- Lupita:
I am asexual, but I want Carmen to settle down.
I know that's important to her.
- Carmen:
I met my boyfriend, Daniel, on [dating app] Hinge in October 2020. I never tried to hide that I'm Siamese, so I received a lot of messages from guys with fetishes.
I knew from the beginning that Daniel was different from the others, because he didn't start with a question about my condition.
I have social anxiety, and have ended up canceling appointments at the last minute, but I felt calm when I was on my way to meet him.
We've been together for two and a half years and we've talked about getting engaged, but first we want to live together.
Daniel and my sister get along very well.
It's funny, because I go to bed later than Lupita, but when Daniel stays over, I go to sleep right away, and he stays talking to her.
Sometimes I feel bad because I want to spend a lot of time with Daniel.
So we try to reach agreements.
For example, (Lupita) chooses where we are going to have dinner or what activity we are going to do.
McCormack hugs Carmen, his girlfriend, along with her sister Lupita.TODAY
Both Daniel and I love children, but we don't want to have any of our own.
I like being a dog mom.
Lupita and I can't get pregnant, we have endometriosis and we also take a hormone blocker that prevents us from menstruating.
"We don't get sick of each other"
- Carmen:
Sometimes, at the end of the day, we are exhausted and we don't want to talk.
So we use different devices and everyone does what they have to do.
I have my laptop to do my homework and Lupita puts on her headphones to listen to music or talk on the phone.
We've been together our whole lives, so it's not like we miss our independence.
It's all we've ever known.
"We are happy just the way we are"
- Carmen:
We share the bloodstream, we share the liver, we share many internal structures.
- Lupita:
If they operated on us to separate us: one of us would die, we would both die or we would end up in the intensive care unit and we would never get out of there.
- Carmen:
Not everything is hunky-dory, we've had many difficulties, but we have a wonderful life.
We go to the movies and concerts (sharing a seat) and we travel by plane.
Last year we went to California and we have also flown to Texas.
We want to exercise again;
before the pandemic we always went to the gym.
We're both veterinarians, so we have to be able to handle fairly large dogs.
My goal is to lift 100 pounds (45 kilos).
"We don't mind sharing clothes"
- Carmen:
Our neighbor has been sewing clothes for us since we were 5 years old.
She makes us all the shirts, dresses, gowns and so on.
We have the same style, but we have tried to have our own
looks
.
We don't usually wear our hair the same length.
When we went to the ophthalmologist, Lupita chose completely different glasses than mine, and she has a piercing on the side of her nose.
I have a septum ring.
"We had a happy childhood"
- Carmen:
Yes, there were times when people could be mean to us.
The “popular” kids infantilized us and talked to us like we were babies.
But we have always shared the same group of friends.
We are still friends with the same people we grew up with.
Lupita has a very good intuition about people, so if she likes them, so do I.
"We absorb each other's feelings"
- Carmen:
When we were almost 6 years old, we both had the same nightmare in which we fell out of a plane, and then we literally fell out of bed.
That only happened once, but we can feel each other's emotions.
That happens all the time.
We were recently in a store and I felt vertigo in my stomach, and I knew it was coming from my sister.
A man pretended to record his daughter, but he was actually recording us.
I didn't realize it, but Lupita did.
She is much more observant.
- Lupita:
I can feel when Carmen is anxious or about to cry.
Her stomach drops.
We hope to normalize conjoined twins by sharing videos on social media
- Carmen:
We received some unpleasant comments.
Many people are not used to people with disabilities setting boundaries or setting boundaries when discussing their disability.
They ask us a lot of questions about sex, how we go to the bathroom and things like that.
But you have to remember: we are not just Siamese twins, we are people.
This interview has been edited for conciseness and clarity.