Abby Hensel, Brittany Hensel and Joshua Bowling. Courtesy of @abbyandbrittanyhensel/TikTok
Conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel are looking back at their whirlwind 2024.
The sisters posted a “2024 Replay” video via TikTok on Monday, December 30, to reflect on some major moments from the past year, including Abby’s wedding to husband Joshua Bowling.
The duo married in November 2021, but the milestone wasn’t made public until March when a video of Abby and Joshua’s first dance went viral. (Today was first to break the news, obtaining the records of their wedding.)
Other images in the 2024 recap included Abby and Brittany, both 34, eating ice cream with Bowling and his daughter, Isabella. The sisters also shared a selfie with Bowling, which was originally posted in October.
Abby and Brittany rose to fame in the late 1990s after making appearances on various daytime TV shows. They then told their story in the 2006 documentary Joined for Life, which aired via TLC. The siblings are dicephalic conjoined twins, a rare form of partial twinning with two heads side by side on one torso. They share the same bloodstream and all organs below the waist with Abby in control of their right limbs and Brittany controlling the left. (The girls’ parents, Mike and Patty Hensel, decided against separating them after birth in 1990 as it was unlikely the duo would survive the procedure.)
@abbyandbrittanyhensel ♬ Cooking Time – Lux-Inspira
When they turned 16, Abby and Brittany showcased the moment — including how they learned to drive — in a second documentary, released in 2008. By 2012, they returned with the TLC docuseries Abby & Brittany. After one season, the series came to an end, and the twins lived a relatively low-key life out of the public eye. Both Abby and Brittany are fifth grade teachers in Brighton, Minnesota.
The sisters have faced widespread criticisms through the years, with some trolls questioning their lifestyle, but Abby and Brittany have remained unbothered.
“This is a message to all the haters out here,” a deep voice could be heard saying in a March TikTok video shared via the twins’ profile. “If you don’t like what I do but watch everything I’m doing, you’re still a fan.”
In a separate clip that same month, they shared a collection of images that included multiple conjoined twin statues.
“The internet is extra LOUD today,” the duo captioned their post. “We have always been around.”
