You've heard about wife swap, but what about baby swap?
This nightmare came true for two sets of parents after an in vitro fertilization (IVF) clinic mistakenly implanted the wrong embryos into both mothers.
Since none of the mothers knew, they spent four months raising a child that wasn't biologically theirs...
"It's still a daily struggle," one of the mothers said.
The baby's complexion was way darker than both of them.
"It was sort of a primal reaction," Alexander told People about his gut feeling.
But since they trusted the doctors at the IVF clinic they went to in California, they didn't say anything.
They had also fallen in love with the baby girl that Daphna carried for nine months.
This all began when the fertility clinic called a month after Daphna gave birth and asked if they could send a photograph of their baby.
Friends and family also questioned why the baby looked nothing like her parents.
The results were disturbing. "We got an email that basically said that she was genetically related to neither of us," said Alexander. "That's when our world started falling apart."
Meanwhile, the embryo, which was made from Daphna's egg and Alexander's sperm, was implanted into the other woman.
As a result, both sets of parents unknowingly raised the other couple's baby for three months.
At the same time, they were scared that their real baby was out there and needed to be found. To find her, the couple hired an attorney to sue the fertility clinic and its owner, Dr. Eliran Mor.
The next day, the Cardinales received an image of their blonde-haired, blue-eyed daughter. The other couple called her Zoe, a name that the Candinales kept. "It's weird learning the name of your child when you didn't name her."
Even the Cardinale's older daughter, Olivia, was devastated by the news. She begged her parents not to make the baby switch.
To help everyone transition to this big change, the couples decided not to make the baby swap right away.
But this, too, proved to be a struggle. So after four months of raising each other's children, they decided to make the permanent swap and allow the babies to live with their biological parents.
During that time, the couples, who live 10 minutes from each other, have created a strong bond with one another.
"There's no book for this," Alexander said. "There's no person to give you advice. So we ended up just sort of huddling together, the four of us, and it's a blessing that we all are on the same page."
With the couple's lawsuit against the IVF clinic, hopefully a baby swap like this doesn't have to happen ever again.
H/T: People
