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Monty Don struggled to hold back tears as he opened up about a horrific car accident his twin sister was involved in during their teens. During an appearance on Gyles Brandreth's podcast, Rosebud, the BBC presenter has opened up about his childhood in Germany. He told listeners how he and his sister Alison were inseparable as children, admitting: "We grew up together completely for the first six years, barely ever apart."

The Gardeners' World star, 70, went on: "We were always in the same class at primary school... we slept in the same room, we shared the same bath, we did everything together." Although the pair drifted apart as they grew older, with Monty later sent away to boarding school, he insisted their essential bond "can't be broken".

But things took an unexpected turn for the family while the broadcaster was on an extended gap year sojourn in the south of France. It was then that he received a telegram from his parents, which he instantly knew was very bad news.

He recalled: "It just said, 'Ring home, Alison, accident." He added that in the mid-1970s, a telegram like that would only have been sent in life-changing circumstances. Through his special connection with his sister, he knew that Alison was gravely injured, admitting: "I knew that she hadn't just fallen off a horse."

Monty told the This Morning presenter that Alison was "terribly injured" in a terrifying car crash. He told listeners: "She was blinded and made tetraplegic, and her lungs... a bag of cement, but and coated her lungs. She was given the last rites."

It was at this point that his voice began to shake as he described how he rushed to his sister's bedside at the Stoke Mandeville hospital. The doting dad went on: "I would lie under her bed and talk to her, and she was blind, and sort of nuts and bolts on her head, and all that sort of thing, and then go out and weep, and then go back and tell her jokes, and tell her about the dogs, and tell her about the garden."

Things soon went from bad to worse for the presenter when, shortly after Alison's accident, their mother suffered from a heart attack and was admitted to the hospital wing. He explained: "I had to cook for my father, who was furious because that was the only way he could express emotion, and he couldn't cook, and he wouldn't eat anything my mother hadn't cooked."

Despite her life-changing injuries, Alison went on to make and incredible recovery and live a full life. Monty beamed: "She got married, had children... although she never got the use of one arm and one eye, and she had endless operations, about 50" With some sadness, the TV presenter admitted that he and Alison can't be as close as they once were.

He told Bradndreth: "I adore my sister, I do adore my sister. I love her as much as it's possible to love another human being who isn't your partner in life. But we don't share it very much." Fearing that his sister may feel "hurt" by their distance, he added: "There is no day-to-day sharing of life. And I feel sad about that. I feel sorry about that."