Wilma Cagle and Welthy Senn, identical twins who turned 100 in November, begin each day together in the same house in Greenville, South Carolina. They dress alike, eat every meal with undiminished enthusiasm, and spend time sitting in their light-filled sun porch.
Between them, they raised eight children — Wilma has three, Welthy five — who now share responsibility for their care. Most live nearby, rotating visits and overseeing a daily schedule of caregiving.
Aside from medication to control blood pressure, neither sister takes daily prescriptions. Both have dementia that primarily affects long-term memory, so Welthy’s daughter, Rebecca Hamby, spoke to TODAY.com about her mother and aunt’s century-long bond and what it looks like now.
“They don’t remember much beyond the present,” Hamby, 76, tells TODAY, “but they always know where the other one is.”
That instinct often reveals itself at night. Welthy and Wilma share a single bedroom, sleeping in separate beds placed a few feet apart. But they still sometimes end up in the same bed, a familiar ritual that has followed them into old age.
After Welthy’s husband died, leaving her widowed at 56, Hamby recalled, her mother would often stay with her twin. On more than one occasion, Wilma’s husband returned to the bedroom to find his wife and her sister already asleep together. Amused, he simply went to find another bed.
For Welthy and Wilma, Hamby said, the arrangement required no explanation. Their spouses, who had been roommates at Clemson University, understood that the twins were each other’s deepest comfort.
That attachment continues to shape their days. About a year ago, Hamby said, Wilma’s daughter planned to take her to a concert, an outing Welthy was not able to join. But on the day of the performance, Hamby found the sisters settled in together, unconcerned with the schedule of the afternoon.
“I never said I would go anywhere without my sister,” Wilma told her.
“That’s just how they are,” Hamby explains. “They want to be together, and it has always been that way. They had an older sister, and it was hard for her, because as long as the twins had each other, that was all that mattered.”
If one sister falls ill, Hamby said, the other becomes visibly distressed, hovering nearby and asking after her. Though they don’t talk about losing each other, Hamby said they often speak about how blessed they feel to still be together.
Hamby feels that when one sister goes, the other will not be far behind.
“I really strongly believe that they have kept each other alive,” Hamby says. “I don’t think one would be living without the other.”
At their 100th birthday celebration in November, more than 140 loved ones gathered to honor them. And while some things have changed — once outgoing, Welthy is now the quieter sister — other things haven’t: they are still most proud to be identical twins, never apart.
A 2016 study from the University of Washington found that identical twins tend to live longer than both fraternal twins and the general population, a benefit researchers say comes from having someone close looking out for you.
For Wilma and Welthy, that research hits close to home.
“The bond they share is truly indescribable,” Hamby says.
This story first appeared on TODAY.com. More from TODAY:
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