Relationships3 min(s) read
Expert gives verdict on extremely common question about conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel's sex life
America’s most famous conjoined twins, Abby and Brittany Hensel, claim to live very normal lives despite sharing a body.
Since appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show at just six years old and starring in many documentaries about themselves since, the sisters, now 36, have fascinated the world, and one question they cannot escape is how they navigate their sex lives.
Has the sisters' relationship changed since one got married?
Abby made headlines when she married her husband, nurse and Army veteran, Josh Bowling, in 2021. Many people were fascinated by how they met and maintained a relationship, while asking very intrusive questions about how their sex life works.
In a 2003 documentary called Joined For Life, Abby and Brittany were adamant that they would become mothers one day. Their own mom, Patty, even said: “That is probably something that could work because those organs do work for them."
The sisters, who are one of only a handful of dicephalus twins in history, have separate heads, brains, spinal cords, hearts, stomachs, and lungs, but they share a circulatory system, a liver, a bladder, and reproductive organs.
Although your sibling being in the room while you are intimate with your partner would be more than a buzzkill and borderline incestuous for most, for Abby and Brittany there is no alternative.
Shortly after Abby got married, intimacy expert Ariella Salinas Fiore offered her thoughts on how the couple navigated intimacy to In Touch.
Unsurprisingly, she said that being open and honest with each other is crucial to maintaining any healthy relationship and sex life, and Abby and Brittany are certainly no exception to the rule.
When asked if she thinks the intimacy between Abby, Brittany, and Josh could be spontaneous, Ariella told the gossip magazine: "I would imagine that this would require not only planning but also exceptional communication between all parties."
How do Abby and Josh maintain their sex life?
Although Salinas Fiore does not know the siblings personally, she believes that the sisters do not have to agree when they are allowed to be intimate, as they are two different people, although they share intimate body parts.
The expert said: "In this scenario, if the twin is not interested, they would have to do any different activity.
"It could be that they wear a sleeping mask or headphones or something to give them some privacy, even though their body is also being used. Of course, this is pure speculation."
Obviously, the major question, or concern, that fans have is whether Brittany feels comfortable or left out when the newlyweds want to get beneath the sheets.
Reassuringly, Ariella predicts: "It depends on how much experience they have in disconnecting from the things that happen to their bodies when their twin is in charge, so to speak."