image copyrightRachel Stone
Rachel Stone was 5 and her brother Ian was 10 when their parents took them on a motorhome holiday to Wales with neighbors.
They spent two fun-filled weeks together, but when they returned, each family split in half and swapped houses.
Rachel and her mother Kay went to live with neighbor Eddie and his daughter Alison.
Eddie's wife Irene and daughter Dawn moved in with Rachel's father Rex and brother Ian.
Rachel tells the BBC's Life Changing podcast about the trauma of separating from her family, the chaos that unfolded and how she has come to forgive her parents.
Rachel and Ian were very happy when a new family moved in next door. "The four of us got along well with them from the first moment."
They were delighted to go on vacation together.
Rachel remembers two caravans parked side by side and a trip to Mount Snowdon.
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But when the time came to return, everything was mixed up and people got into the wrong cars.
"Panic, fear and anguish"
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Rachel remembers her mother leaning back in the passenger seat and saying: "'We're going to have a new family. We're going to live in number 8 with Eddie and Alison. Alison is going to be your new sister."
"And your father and brother will still live at number 10. And Aunt Irene and Dawn will live there too. And Dawn will be your brother's new sister."
Rachel immediately felt "a lot of panic, fear and anguish" and remembers bursting into tears.
As the car roared forward, she felt "bewildered, but also a little excited." He liked Alison and had always wanted a sister.
That night, Alison let her sleep on the top bunk and the next morning the adults exchanged their belongings between the houses where they lived.
Rachel says she felt very confused. "It's inevitable to think it's your fault."
Life in number 8, where Rachel now lived, was very different to that in number 10.
Their old house was clean, while this one had "dog hair, greasy remains, car stuff."
His mother was "firm but fair" and very practical.
Her stepfather, Eddie, was never mean to her. "But I never called him dad. I wasn't his little girl."
I missed Ian so much. "I was very proud of him. He was my big brother."
"When I was little, I used to wait for him in the front yard when he came home from school."
A chaotic new life
Rachel was 7 years old when the two couples went to court together and got divorced.
Subsequently, they married their new partners in simple and discreet ceremonies at the civil registry.
Rachel didn't even know her father had married Irene until she saw the wedding photo.
His visits to his old house decreased when he was about 11 or 12 years old. He found it difficult to visit his father and did not get along with Irene.
Meanwhile, life with her mother Kay and Eddie was chaotic.
"[He] was quite possessive and controlling. When he was 13, she [his mother] said, 'This is unsustainable, we can't live like this.'"
Rachel called school her "escape." She got good grades and became a teacher.
She married and had two children, but is now separated and works as a business consultant.
The unanswered question
Throughout her life, Rachel's mother never spoke of the exchange. "I asked him a lot of questions. He told me it was complicated."
Decades later, during a family vacation with her own children, Rachel asked again.
"I told my mother, 'Joseph is already 10 years old... Ian was 10 when you let him go with dad and Irene.'"
His mother was "beside herself, consumed by guilt and shame, by her selfish decisions."
"Years later, she said to me, with the words I had almost wanted to hear all my life: 'I'm so sorry I let you down and I want to try to make it up to you.'"
Rachel says that was the beginning of rebuilding a "wonderful" relationship with her mother.
Rachel never had a close relationship with her father. "He told me he had to choose between his wife and his children. Unfortunately for me, he chose his wife."
He and Irene remained together until his death at age 81.
But when speaking at her father's funeral, Rachel said she felt she owed him an apology.
"I imagined the character of a perfect father who had been taken from me. I created this superhuman being who could be everything."
"And I wanted it to be that way. But I also believe that you have to accept people for who they are."
"I think parents do the best they can. You can't expect your parents to be something they're not."
This article was originally written in English and we used an artificial intelligence tool to translate it. BBC journalists reviewed the text before publication. Learn more about how we use AI.
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