- [Interviewer] If you
were alone in a room with conjoined twins, what would you ask? (gentle music) - Hi ladies. - Hello.
- Hello. - I'm very excited to be here guys. If I can say, I've never
met a set of conjoint twins. - Most people haven't. (laughs) - What are your names? - I'm Carmen.
I'm Lupita. - Lovely. Can I ask how old you guys are? - We are 21. And Carmen's a student and I'm a college dropout. (laugh) - Like, how are you guys conjoined? 'cause I can't... (laughing) - We're basically connected at the torso and we share a pelvis, stuff like that. We have two separate hearts. We don't share a brain, obviously. Reproductive system basically the same, digestive system, we have
two separate stomachs but it connects into basically one
digestive system, excuse me. We have one leg each so it took a long time to learn
how to coordinate walking. - Yeah. - 17 years actually. - Yeah. - Wow.
- Exactly. - Do you girls feel the same
physical sensations and stuff? - Our own sides are our own sides. - And like that's like, if you get stung by a bee, Carmen won't feel that crap? - Yeah.
- Yeah. - Exactly. - Fashion wise, do you guys
get custom clothing much or is it fairly regular shopping? - Shirts, we buy two of tops and then we have a seamstress
that sows them together. - Oh, really? Wow.
- Yeah. - Do you guys have some type
of telepathy between you guys? - So how do I put this? We can't read each other's minds. - Are you able to read each other's emotional states really well? - Yes.
- Yes actually. We both kinda have anxiety. Lupita has it a little
bit worse than I do. It's more of like a gut feeling
if that makes any sense. I am a very big introvert, but because she doesn't like
to speak a lot to new people, I kind of am forced to
become more of an extrovert and she is the comedic relief (laughs) kind of thing. - I'm really good at one liners. (laughs) - How was it growing up for you guys? - Kids would sometimes bully us. But because my mom raised us to not take (beep) from people. - Amen to that. - Like, I can't. I'm too Mexican to really teach- - You guys are Mexican? - Yeah.
- Yeah. - No way. What's your last name?
- Andrade. - Andrade?
- Solis. - Perez over here. - Yeah, I was curious just kinda what school
was like for you guys? Would you guys cheat off each other or is it safe to assume? (laughs) - I mean, yeah. When we were little, we
would cheat off each other to a point in about third grade, they put a curtain between us. - Oh, wow. - So it lasted about two
months, three months. - Wow. - Then they caved. - Yeah. - We went to an agricultural high school. So we would get to interact with animals and stuff like that. - That's really cool. Do you guys drive? - Yeah, I control the
steering wheel, the gas. Lupita kinda just does the turn signals and is like the DJ. - Is she a good driver, Lupita? - Yes, but road rage. - Ah. (Lupita and Carmen laugh) - I was genuinely curious, whether you're still
trick or treating or not, how have you divvied up candy? - Our mom was super Catholic so we didn't go trick or treating. - Oh my God, no! - So once we went with friends, we did didn't even dress up. We just walked around with them and the elderly mostly were like, "Oh my God, I love your costume." And we're like, "Oh, okay. Thanks." - Of course. (laughs) - Yeah. - What are the most common annoying questions that people ask you? - If one goes to jail, does the other one have to sit in jail too or what happens. I don't know. Never been to jail. - Like being in public I can imagine that You get a lot of stares and
how does that make you feel? - We'd prefer the stares a bit more than the unsolicited taking
pictures of us in public type of thing.
- Oh yeah. No. - So yeah. - Ugh, do people really do that? - Yeah. - Oh God. I'm sorry. - I guess the biggest
thing is a lot of people like to reduce us down to just body parts. When they refer to us it's more of a, "So if one head does one thing what happens to the other head?" Kinda thing instead of like- - Using our names.
- Using our names. It's just more of dehumanizing, if that makes any sense? - Was there an option of separation? - So our parents tried to find doctors that can. But we finally got a
finally got our answer of no when we were like four years old. - And if they tried to separate us, either one of us would pass away, both of us could pass away or we wouldn't never leave
the hospital type of thing from needing so many either transplants or
other medical procedures and things like that to stay alive. - From a very early on age we have accepted who we are. I mean we can wish all
we want, it won't happen. - Yeah. - And we are proud of who we are and what our condition is. And we won't, and can't
change, anything about it. - It's all about just
embracing who you are, right? - What was it like going
through puberty together? - It was an interesting time. - Yeah. - Like for everybody. It was a time where we thought, we kind of wished where we were a little bit more separate. I think it was the whole boy crazy kind of thing. - Oh, okay. - Crush.
- Yeah. Right. - Did you end up having a lot of the same or similar crushes? Do you have the same type? - No. - No? - I really didn't have any crushes. Well I'm asexual and aromantic. - So just no on that front, right? - No. - I've been dating my current boyfriend for about a year now. - Right on. What's his name? - Daniel. - Daniel. How'd you meet Daniel? - We met off of Hinge. (laughs) - You can dial me up if you want. (all laugh) I'm curious to know how was that? Like in the Hinge profile, did you- - Not gonna lie, it was really awkward. - Did you show, in the profile, did you show everything
or was it kind of like- - I mean, yeah. I was obviously gonna be
transparent about everything. It was a learning process for everybody. We obviously had to have a discussion on what boundaries are
okay and what aren't and we're not intimate in that way and he's okay with that, and yeah. - It's like just having a good partner basically, right? - Yeah. Exactly. Is Lupita a good wing woman? - No. She likes to make fun of everyone. (laughs) I make fun of both of them, it's fine. - So is marriage anything
that you all consider one day? - It's not really in the front of my mind nor back of my mind at the
moment because we are 21. Whoever, who I'm currently dating or in the future might be dating, I'd prefer to be life
partners than actual marriage. - So you guys mentioned going to an agricultural high school. Were you planning to pursue
anything agricultural? - We are currently actually, Lupita is gonna go for vet assistant and I'm going for vet tech. - You're working on similar degrees so you can work together with your-
- Exactly. - Oh, that's really cool. - We volunteer at vet clinic twice a week and then we
also work at a goat farm. What is it about, I guess animals, that you love so much. - They don't judge and they don't speak so they can't say rude
things or they headbutt you but they can't physically tell you, "You look like this," kinda thing. - I'm Olivia. - I'm Isabella. We are identical twins. How tall are you guys? - We're very short. I'm 4'8, Lupita's 4'6.5. - Yeah, we're 4'11.
- Yeah, we're 4'11. - Short twin club. - Yes.
- Yes. - We should make our own club.
- I feel like so many twins are short. Like Mary-Kate and Ashley are short too. - Yeah.
- It adds to the whole like, "Oh, you guys are so cute." And it's like, sometimes it
can be a little condescending. - Sometimes it's a little fetishizing. - That's what I was just gonna say. - Since the age of nine,
we've been kind of fetishized for number one, being conjoined and then another thing of like, oh yeah, a lot of people's idea of just having sex with two people
at once kind of thing. - Yeah. - Yeah. What's annoying
is I'm like that's incest. I don't wanna have sex with my sister.
- They ask us do you wanna have a three-way. It's stuff like that. It's so inappropriate to ask anybody. - Exactly. - Do you consider being conjoined a disability? - No.
- No. - No. - I mean, it's a disability
if you make it a disability. If we just let our minds go where a lot of people think our minds go of just wishing we were separated or just not accepting who
we are, that kind of thing, all we'd be is in bed and
depressed and stuff like that. - Yes, I have depression but... - That's not the point. We just have to keep going because we gotta spite everyone
that thinks that we can't. - There you go. Prove all them haters wrong, right? - Exactly. - I guess what's your favorite
part about being a twin? - We have this level of understanding
that nobody else will. - Yes.
- Yes. - But not in the sense of like,
oh we're besties for life, that kind of thing. More about like even if I have a partner, they'll never really understand how I'm truly feeling from the get go other than Lupita. - What are some things that you would want people
to know about you guys? - We are two separate people. - And we are capable of whatever we want. - Damn right. - That's pretty much it.
- Short and simple, right? It's how it should be. - You guys are very sweet and inspiring. I like that a lot. - You guys are awesome. - [Carmen] Thank you. - Just had to say that. - [Interviewer] Would you guys like to just say hi to each other? - Yes. - Hi. Nice to meet you. - It's very lovely talking to you guys. - Likewise. Thank you. - What's your TikTok? Are you involved in TikTok? - It's literally our names. Carmen and Lupita. - Damn, you guys got a man following huh? - Yeah, literally... (laughing) We're like in the four foot club. (laughing)
