Conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel share new wedding footage
FILE - Bride and groom seen cutting wedding cake at reception. (Silas Stein/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel shared more footage from Abby’s 2021 wedding on TikTok, as well as a second video with a message which appeared to be directed at their critics.
The first of two videos, which were shared on Thursday, showed the twins with their arms around Army veteran Josh Bowling as they danced at Abby’s wedding. The video was paired with Adele’s song, "Rolling in the Deep."
In the second video, the twins posted a montage from Abby’s wedding day, according to the New York Post.
The caption in that video read, "We know you think you know us," followed by two heart emojis (one black and one red with flames) and several hashtags including #sisterhoodgoals, #abbyandbrittanyhensel, and #happy.
Abby, 34, quietly married Bowling in 2021 but news of the nuptials only came to light this year after Today obtained public records in March 2024.
Today and other news outlets also cited the Hensels’ Facebook profile picture, which appears to show a wedding photo – featuring the conjoined twins in a white wedding dress holding hands with a man in a gray suit.
Abby and Brittany are now fifth grade teachers and live in Minnesota, where they were born and raised, Today reported.
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Abby and Brittany are dicephalus conjoined twins, a rare phenomenon in which the twins have two heads side by side on one torso. They have separate hearts and stomachs, one pair of arms and one pair of legs. Their spines join at the pelvis, they share a bloodstream, and share organs from the waist down.
Abby controls their right arm and leg, while Brittany controls the left.
The conjoined twins first gained notoriety in 1996 during an appearance on "The Oprah Winfrey Show." Their lives were later documented on TLC, with the show following them as they worked to finish college and traveled through Europe.
The idea of separating the twins was dismissed by both parents from the start, with doctors saying there was little chance that both could survive the procedure, according to a Time interview with the family in 2001.
"How could you pick between the two?" their father, Mike, told Time.
Dr. Joy Westerdahl, the family's physician who assisted at their birth, said in 2001 that it was impossible to guess about their long-term prognosis, but marveled at their ability to synchronize such complex motions with two separate brains, including clapping hands, learning to walk, swimming and riding a bike.
In the 2003 documentary "Joined for Life," their mother said Abby and Brittany were interested in having children one day.
"That is probably something that could work because those organs do work for them," Patty said in the documentary, according to Today.
"Yeah, we're going to be moms," Brittany said. "We haven't thought about how being moms is going to work yet. But we're just 16 — we don't need to think about that right now."
Kelly Hayes contributed to this report. This story was reported from Los Angeles.