Kathleen Gillespie

*Warning you will find details within this story distressing*

Kathleen Gillespie courageously shares her family’s story of extreme trauma, and how she has fought hard to salvage peace from pain.  Her husband Patsy was killed in an IRA bomb he was forced to drive to an army checkpoint at Coshquin, in October 1990.  Patsy & five soldiers were killed.

In this conversation, Kathleen opens up about the darkness that descended and how she battled within herself to create a legacy of peace for her husband.  She chats honestly about the challenges of embarking on peacemaking conversations, that led her into engagement with people she didn't want to encounter.

This podcast was recorded prior to the British government’s recent announcement of intent to create a statute of limitations for all Troubles related killings.  But here, Kathleen puts on record her views on justice, forgiveness & what she would say if she met those who took Patsy’s life.

Keep listening right to the end - where Kathleen shares a gorgeous story of a family miracle that has brought her hope!

*Show Notes*

/Patsy Gillespie - a dad of 3 children and husband to Kathleen.  He was strapped into a van by an IRA gang and forced to drive a bomb into a British Army checkpoint on the border between Derry and Donegal on 24 October 1990.  He and 5 soldiers were killed.

/Glencree - a centre for conflict resolution in Co Wicklow, that specialises in inclusive dialogue, mediation, negotiation and peace education.

/Wave - an organisation based in Northern Ireland that offers care and support to anyone bereaved, injured or traumatised through the civil unrest here.

Transcript

Jude: You're listening to Peace by Piece, I’m Jude Hill, and this is a space for us all to get curious together about those who are pushing on against all the odds to build peace. What sparks them? What keeps them going? What have they personally lost along the way? But what have they salvaged and discovered? What's working and not working when it comes to reconciliation? And are we ready yet to put words to some of our most difficult stories? In each episode we get to hear from someone who is actively pursuing peace. We listen in as they share honestly about complex journeys, and we'll try to reflect piece by piece, story by story, on how peace is really doing.

Today's podcast is with an absolute powerhouse of a woman, Kathleen Gillespie. She's been proactive about dialogue and peacebuilding conversations for 30 years now. You may have heard her name mentioned in the House of Commons recently, the day after the British government announced its intention to end troubles prosecutions. Here, you'll get the chance to hear Kathleen’s story of courage in full. Her husband Patsy was blown up in an IRA bomb he'd been forced to drive to an army checkpoint on the Derry/Donegal border in October 1990. He and five soldiers were killed. From the agonising darkness of this loss, Kathleen chose to build peace and have painful conversations. In this episode, this formidable woman of peace shares about the pains and joys of family life, how she and Patsy fell in love and how she fought to create a peaceful legacy for him. Kathleen also mentions her strong friendship with one of my other podcast guests, Anne Walker, who was in the IRA as a young woman. Anne and Kathleen have connected through the telling of their stories and now facilitate others in dialogue. Kathleen's voice cries out to be listened to and in this chat she shares how victims and survivors need to be supported at this time. So thanks for listening in, here is my conversation with Kathleen Gillespie.

Jude: I'm glad to see that you put makeup on, you did promise that for me.

Kathleen: Yes, oh I wouldn't appear in public without makeup, Anne knows that.

Jude: Well, I put a wee bit on for you as well, so-

Kathleen: And this is as good as public.

Jude: You look great. 

Kathleen: Thank you.

Jude: Are you enjoying the sunshine? 

Kathleen: Well, I'm not a sun person. We were out for tea yesterday which was nice. We were buying more plants.

Jude: This garden of yours sounds like it's worth paying into to be honest.

Kathleen, it's so great to see you. I know you're not a fan of online chat, so I appreciate you putting yourself through that for me. 

Kathleen: That's okay Jude.

Jude: Kathleen, tell us a wee bit about your family because I know you have a wee hoard of grandchildren now. 

Kathleen: Oh god aye, I have six grandchildren now. I have three living children. My firstborn baby was a stillborn, a full-term stillborn boy, and then after that, 11 months later, I had Patrick and then 14 months after that I had Kieran. I was told not to have any more because of the problems I had with birth and pregnancy but it took me five years to persuade Patsy to let me try for a girl because I knew he wanted to girl. So I ended up having my girl. So two boys and a girl we've got, and between them now I have six grandchildren. 

Jude: Lovely. Kathleen, a question I'm asking everyone who comes on here: can you tell us where or when you feel most at home? 

Kathleen: I live in what was originally my husband's family home. It was where he was brought up, and we moved in here and bought this house after his mother and father died. We had our own house in the town, a big house that we’d bought, it had four bedrooms, a garage and- Patsy wanted to move back when his mummy and daddy died. Patty wanted to move back to his family home, which was- I mean, that was fine, I was happy with that, because at that stage we were nearly in the country. We have loads of ground around the house, plenty of room for the kids to play, which we didn’t have in the house in Derry because it opened out onto the front street. So I feel really good here because I feel- you know, people are strange about what I'm going to say, but I feel that Patsy’s here with me, and I feel happy here. 

Jude: There's a comfort in that for you. 

Kathleen: Yeah.

Jude: Well before, Kathleen, we ask you to share about your loss of Patsy, tell us how you guys met.

Kathleen: Well, I worked with a girl who lives in- I'm in number 15 here at the top of a cul de sac, and I worked with the girl who lives down at the bottom of the street beside the car park, and she invited me out for tea one Tuesday night. It was the fourth of July, 1967 and she invited me out for tea. And Patsy at that time had came round on a mobile fruit and vegetable van, and he called at the house and my friend's mother says, ‘oh, I’ve a grand girl for you here tonight Patsy’, and he came in and he was all, ‘hello, hello, hello’, and that was fine. My friend then walked me up to the bus stop. I was only 16 at the time, and my friend walked me up to the bus stop afterwards and Patsy drove up in his car and went into the shop to get a message in. She came out and she says to him, ‘Here, give Kathy a lift home’, you know, whatever. Anyway, he offered me a left home. I agreed. And that was the start of it. A 16 year old in 1967 having a boyfriend with a car was a definite ‘no-no’. Definitely. So that's how we met and it just went on from there. We got engaged when I was 17, we got married and I was 20. So, that was it.

Jude: Kathleen, can you take us back to October 1990 and that night then? What were you doing as a family that day and how was it all interrupted?

Kathleen: Well, my eldest son, Patrick, that was his 18th birthday. He had gone to London to work and earn money to buy himself a car because we were, out of necessity, running two cars. And Kieran was working that night. We normally visited friends of ours on a Tuesday night. Kieran was due home from work, and we left Jennifer here and went down to visit our friends, but, you know, warned her not to be  answering the phone or- expecting Kieran to be home but Kieran didn’t come home as early as he was supposed to. About half 10 I kind of felt anxious thinking Jennifer might still be in the house on her own. So we came home at half 10. When we drove up to the house, and I got out to open the door there was a single key stuck on the door, and I thought, you know, that's strange. But I came into the house while Patsy was parking the car and the hall was in darkness. It just felt strange, you know. The hall was in darkness, and at that somebody ran up the hall, and I felt the gun sticking in my neck- not realising it was a gun, I thought it was my son, Kieran, playing ’silly-beggars’. And I said to him Kieran, you know, that's not funny, you know, but it wasn't Kieran. It was one of the IRA men and at that another one ran down the hall. And I actually heard Jennifer crying here in the living room, and I ran in here to her. She was sitting in the arm chair and there was a man with a gun standing more or less over her. I sat down beside her and Patsy came in and they brought him into the living room. Questions all the time: ‘Who are you expecting in? Are you expecting any phone calls?’ And I was asking questions back again, you know, what's happening? Because our house had been taken over four years previous to that, and our car was loaded, at that time, with 200 pounds of explosives, and Patsy was forced to drive into Fort George. Now, when he would drive towards Fort George, they would just open the gates and wave him in, because that's where he worked, and he was able to drive the car into a loading bay and jump out and shout a warning, and they did an explosion in the car- controlled explosion in the car. Patsy got home. So, I sort of thought; same thing all over again. You know what I mean? But they just kept saying to me, if you do what you’re told nobody’ll get hurt, you know, and I believed him because that's what had happened the last time, but that's not what happened. Midnight came and they were taking them away at midnight- this all started about 1030- and they let him in here to the living room to say goodbye to us, and he sat down on the arm of the chair beside me, and he put his arms around me and says, ‘Everything will be alright, we’ll be okay’. And they took him away then. 

Jude: And did you believe that at that point? 

Kathleen: I didn't worry about it because I thought it's gonna be the same as before. When they were there in 1986, they had taken the car away and brought it back loaded and Patsy drove from here. This time they hadn't taken the car away. I think there was two in the car with Patsy, because I think there were three left in the house here with me. I would say that those people that went in the car with Patsy had to remove their masks because they were going over the checkpoint, and they couldn't go over the checkpoint with their masks on. So I would say that Patsy knew from that time that- this is only me surmising what happened- and I would say that Patsy knew from that time if he saw them without their masks. So, the explosion was at 4am. So that was four hours that Patsy had. And I think that those four hours- I call it maybe his purgatory or something, because he must have known he wasn't getting home again from then on. 

Jude: And Kathleen, that's really difficult knowledge for you to have then.

Kathleen: I console myself in the fact that they couldn't hurt him physically, because they needed them to do the job that they wanted done. What they did was they chained him to the van. What happened here in the house was that at five minutes to four the phone in this room rang. The man that I thought was in charge grabbed the phone and he listened to it, he let it ring four times, and then he pulled the wire off the receiver and remember, we're talking about 1970 here, we didn’t have hands free and all that craic ... pulled the wire off the receiver and threw the phone down and he says, ‘We're going now’, he says, ‘Give us half an hour before you ring anybody and your husband will be home by that time’. And a couple of minutes after they left, I was kneeling on the sofa looking out the window when I had the explosion and turned around to everybody, you know, the wee ones and that, and said, ‘That’s the car gone. Your daddy’ll be home soon, we’ll be alright, daddy’ll be home soon’. But I decided I would walk down the street to meet Patsy coming home, because the last time after the explosion the police had left him, dropped him at the bottom of the street. So I walked down thinking that I would meet Patsy coming home, and as I walked down the road, an army checkpoint- a landrover just stopped and set up a checkpoint on the road. And I started asking them did they know where Patsy - they must have thought I wasn’t wise. But when I looked around, my friend who I had phoned, she came up behind me and took me back to the house again. And then it was just a matter of waiting, waiting to see what news came in. It was about seven o'clock in the morning - half six/seven when all the media - the car park was full of them at that time, and my car was coming up on the phone- up on the TV- and it was saying large explosion, five soldiers murdered and civilians suspected to be murdered. 

Jude: And Kathleen for you, when you realise the full barbarity of what happened to Patsy, how did you comprehend that in your own head? 

Kathleen: See, I went through a stage where I thought Patsy’s not really dead. You know, he got free and he’s hiding somewhere. And things happened afterwards that I thought - there was one night, a stormy night when the rosebush scratched against the glass, and I thought, ‘Is Patsy trying to get in the window?’ And I had packed bags for me and the wee ones because I thought someday Patsy’s going to ring and say, Right, somebody’s gonna come and get yous and bring you to me. I had suitcases packed for us just to run when the time came because I just wouldn’t - you must realise that there was nobody that- I had nobody. You know, I had a closed coffin, so I had no proof that Patsy was dead. I just thought no, Patsy can’t be dead. So, I hadn't accepted that Patsy was dead. And I didn't fully accept that Patsy was dead until the inquest, when they started talking about numbered body bags and body pieces, and one police man, during the course of the investigation of the bomb site, said about lifting a stone and they found a human heart, and digging down and they found a bum cheek, as well. And I thought, you know, when I thought about that I thought, ‘He’s talking about bits of Patsy’s body’, you know.

Jude: And that must have been absolutely agony for you to listen to.

Kathleen: I got up and ran out. I was told I had to be at the inquest. I was told afterwards that there was no necessity for me to be there. But I got up and ran out. And I had my local parish priest- he came with me to the inquest - and he took me home. And then I got my daughter, and we went off down to Malin Head to visit a friend of mine for the rest of the day, because I just couldn't stay about the house and it was until the inquest that I still thought, ‘Someday I'll get a phone call from Patsy, we could end up anywhere’. You know, because the Ministry of Defence had offered to move us, and then thereafter to move me if I wanted to get moved away somewhere. I said, ‘No, this is Patsy's home’, and when Patsy wouldn't move after the first time the house was taken over. I'm certainly not going to move now, because this is his home. So I'm still here 40 years later. I’m 47 years in this house.

Jude: Which says a lot about your strength, really.

Kathleen: Well, I wouldn't dream of moving out. 

Jude: How did you as a family get by in the days and weeks after that when all the facts were coming out like that? 

Kathleen: Do you know something, Jude, I really don't remember. I know that I locked myself in the bedroom a couple of times with a box of tablets, when Jennifer was at school and the boys were working. I thought I can’t - and then common sense told me well, they've lost their daddy, I can't have them losing me as well, they need me. You just - you just get through. But I came to the conclusion - this is when I started working in peace and reconciliation - because I thought - it came home to me one day, when a woman said to me, I was telling her about getting a counsellor for Jennifer, and she says, ‘Well who’s counselling you while the counsellors counselling her?’ And I said, ‘Well, nobody. I'm looking after them and that’s it’, because I was terrified that the boys would do something to get back at them. Revenge, you know, a bit of revenge. And I thought, how am I going to keep them from joining these organisations or doing something to get revenge for what happened to their daddy. Then I decided - I started doing some training in different things like listening ear, doing facilitation and doing mediation.

Jude: And Kathleen, this was all quite soon after Patsy's death, how did you get the strength to do that when, you know, your husband had been used as a human bomb, and you were going through so much agony? How did you make that choice?

Kathleen: I made the choice because I was thinking of suicide. And I thought, ‘I’m gonna have to do something to stop these thoughts’. I just didn't imagine myself living without Patsy, without him there. I still can't believe that I've lived 30 years without him.The wee ones have grown up, we’ve now got grandchildren, and I can't believe I'm doing it without him. I don't know where I get the strength to do that, and I did realise that I needed something to distract me, something to help me to get over the bad part where I wanted to die, I didn't want to live any longer. And it was the best thing I ever did, because that's what got me started then into dialoguing with ex paramilitaries and eventually doing the show and meeting Anne Walker. And that was all good stuff, if you can say good stuff could come out of something bad. But what I do say in my testimony, when I'm doing the show, I pray he did not die in vain. And I just feel I'm only doing this because he's dead. There's a lot of good stuff has come out of this work that I'm doing, and the people that I've met and the people that I’ve worked with. And I just feel that it was a good path for me to follow at the time, and it still is.

Jude: And Kathleen, do you remember the first time that you would have shared your story? Like, emotionally, how difficult was that for you?

Kathleen: It was very difficult, but there were other people there sharing horror stories. You know, people who had been in bombs themselves, people who had lost children. I cannot - I don't think I'd have the strength if one of my children - something happened to them. I don't know where I would get the strength to deal with that. And these people were talking about losing their children in bombs. And I just thought, ‘Well, if they can do it, I can do it’, and it was very difficult, I cried a lot. Well, everybody was crying. But you know, it's very strange, because after I had told the story in this group, and everybody was talking to me, I felt later - I felt that a weight had been lifted off my shoulders, and that gave me the courage to continue on. Now, I was going down to Glencree, maybe about four years, maybe five years, before it was suggested that we would meet with ex-paramilitaries, and to be honest with you, I was horrified. I was just horrified, I thought, ‘How the hell do they think I'm going to sit and talk to ex-paramilitaries after what they did to Patsy’, and I started getting flashbacks and I jumped up and ran out of the room, and one of the facilitators came after me to make sure I was okay. I remember coming back home after that weekend, and I thought to myself, ‘Well, you know, really, this is the next step in the process that I'm doing’, talking to these ex-paramilitaries and finding out what I really, really wanted to find out, which was why - how they could justify what they did. How they could justify everything. Why did they think it was okay? And that's what I say now whenever somebody says to me, because I have no forgiveness in my soul, even though I'm working with an ex-IRA woman, and she’s- aw, she’s so good to me. I would say she's one of my really best friends, and she does a lot for me, and I’d be lost without her, but it doesn't mean I forgive the IRA for what they did just because I'm working with her. A lot of people say to me, when we're talking about forgiveness, and the fact that I don't forgive, is if one of them came to your door and said, ‘I’m one of the men that was in your house that night, and I want to ask for your forgiveness’. What would you do? I say, ‘Well, I would tell him I wasn't going to forgive him to start off with’. There's no way I would forgive him. But I say I would bring him in and give him a cup of tea or coffee, whatever he wanted, but then I would ask him to explain how he, along with a group of people could sit down and plan - actually plan- what they did that night, because Patsy  wasn't the only one that was kidnapped that night. There were three different people all over the North captured, but Patsy was the only one that was killed, the other two escaped.

Jude: And have you, Kathleen, ever got closer to an answer to that in all the group work you've done, and all the people you've encountered?

Kathleen: Nobody can give me an answer - a proper answer - to that, except for the people who were involved in it, and they're not going to come to me to tell me and explain to me.

Jude: Can you take us back then to the first time you were in a room with somebody who was active in the IRA and what that experience was like for you and your journey?

Kathleen Hmm. Aye, I remember we organised a weekend at Glencree and there was going to be a panel of ex-combatants. I was trying to get my children, one of them at least, to come down with me to Glencree for a weekend and Jennifer said she would go down with me. Now, I told Jennifer what was going to happen on the Saturday, but I said there's a separate thing happening. The coach is taking people into Bray shopping if they don't want to attend this panel thing. But she said she would attend it. Just thinking about it now, I was so proud of her, because I thought she would just sit there. Now, we were in a circle around the room, and I remember when I saw her hand going up I thought, ‘Oh shit’, you know, what is it she's going to say? But she started asking them, saying to them, ‘What did you do and why did you do it? And do you think it was all right to do it?’ And I thought - I was sitting crying because I thought, ‘I don't believe she's actually doing this’, and I was so proud of her, I really was so proud of her. But afterwards - both her and I smoked at the time - thank god I don't smoke anymore, she still does - but anyway, I said to her - because I took food wherever I went because I'm diabetic, so I always had a picnic - so I said to her, ‘Come on, we’ll go up to my room, and there's a big wide window seat, and we'll open the window up, we’ll have a picnic, and we'll smoke out the room and we’ll not tell anybody where we are’. So that's what we did. And that's when I found out exactly what happened that night in the house when she was in on her own and they came on her.

Jude: And what age was Jennifer at the time?

Kathleen: She was 12, and that's why I was anxious to get home early because I just thought I was- we had never left her on her own before. They kept saying to me, ‘We didn't touch her Missus, we didn't touch her’, even though Jennifer was screaming. ‘We didn't touch her, we didn't touch her’. When Jennifer and I had that afternoon on our own in my room, she told me that she still has nightmares. Now, this is going back- and she said they stuck a gun to her head, stuck a gun to her head, forced her into the armchair. And she still has nightmares. She thinks they’re coming to get her and they’re pulling her feet out of the bed all. I mean, I didn't realise that-  as I say, they kept saying, ‘We didn’t touch her Missus, we didn't touch her’, but sure, I've learned not to believe them anyway.

Jude: You made a really conscious decision, obviously, after Patsy's murder that you were going to take a path of peace and that his death was going to contribute to that. Can you tell us, Kathleen, what you had etched into Patsy's gravestone, because that's such a powerful story.

Kathleen: Well, I just really, really wanted to write on it, ‘Murdered by the IRA’. And then I sort of thought, ‘No, that's not a nice thing to put - that's not a nice thing to put on your husband's headstone’. So I got them to print on it, ‘Lord, may he be an instrument of your peace’. And that's when I say then, ‘And I pray he did not die in vain’. So I felt stronger about that. You know, I felt very angry. I was full of hatred and anger. Do you know that I was advised by a surgeon - I hadn't told him, talked to him about what happened to Patsy or told him who I was, maybe he recognised me, I don't know - but he said to me, ‘I’m more concerned about this rash your body Miss Gillespie’. He said, ‘This rash is caused by extreme stress. I'm worried in case- I know by that rash that in ten years time - in five years time, you'll be in a wheelchair and in 10 years time, you'll be dead. And if you don't get rid of the stress in your life, this is your future. You have to do something. I'm not going to ask you about the stress, I'm just telling you now you have to get rid of it’. Hatred and anger. Those are the two words that would describe how I felt. I just had to learn to get rid of that. I can't go so far as to say that I'll forgive them because that's never going to happen, but I've got the stage now where I can work with them and decide who I can’t work with and who I can work with.

Jude: And did you actually feel the hatred and anger lift? 

Kathleen: I did. I had to work on it. I prayed a lot about it because I was worried for my own health. I was worried that I was going to die and leave the kids before they had their own lives sorted out. And I just had to pray about it all the time. It came about with working and dialoguing with ex-paramilitaries, when I decided - because I had decided that it was very selfish of me to expect other people - if I wasn't prepared to talk to these people and try and see sense - well, help them to try and see sense, or find out why they were doing things, if I wasn't willing to do that, it's very selfish of me to expect other people to do it.

Jude: And Kathleen, you've been involved in peace work, storytelling now for over 30 years. What keeps you going with it? Because obviously, you're having to share your pain over and over again- what gives you the energy to keep pushing forward with that?

Kathleen: The response that we get from the workshops that we do, and the work that we're doing is unbelievable in some cases. Maybe it’s - I don't know- big headed of me or something. I just feel that the work that I'm doing is doing some good and that Patsy’s always there making sure that I'm okay, and that - I just feel that he's there encouraging me to do it, and I just feel that from the responses that we get that it’s doing somebody some good. So therefore, that encourages me to keep going and keep going. As much as I don't like these zoom calls and this way of approaching it, I like the fact that before this COVID came and we were meeting people in person - I mean, you can go up to them and hold their hand, or you can watch their faces and watch their responses, and you can always go to somebody after the workshops over and make sure that they're okay and talk to them, and that just seems to give me strength to the next one.

Jude: Kathleen, no one has ever been convicted over Patsy’s murder, so obviously the justice route hasn't opened up for you as a family. How has that impacted on your journey around peace and reconciliation? Does that cast a shadow for you?

Kathleen: Well, I've had to give up the fact that I wanted - I wanted somebody to be caught. I still would like somebody to be charged with it, but I've talked myself out of the fact because that is, to me- smacks of a bit of revenge or something. And that's okay, because if they do something bad it’s what they say: ‘If you can't do the time don’t do the crime’. But I just feel that they’re old men now probably, the boys that done it. 

Jude: And you are in conversation and in touch with so many families who have lost like you. What do you feel that hurting families need at this stage? What helps? Or can anything help on this journey?

Kathleen: Well, what helped me was knowing that there were people there to help me. There were people there who would come to me and say, you know - I mean, I had a phone call this morning from Wave, just to make sure I was okay and to make sure - to see was there anything I needed them to do for me. And that's what people need: to know that they're not left standing on their own.

Jude: And people will look at you, Kathleen, and see that you've shown incredible strength of character and courage to be able to do what you do and to turn to peace so quickly after what happened. How would you sum up what that was that you gathered within yourself to be able to do that? What was that spark? 

Kathleen: Well, it was the fact that my children needed looking after, and then when I started working in peace and reconciliation and saw the effect that the people that were doing the work that I was doing, the effect that we had on people that we visited, that we talked to, and that just makes you feel so good, when you think that you've helped somebody. And it's great because I had people there to help me and I know what it feels like, for somebody to lift the phone and somebody says to you, ‘How are you Kathleen, are you okay? Is there anything I can do for you?’ You know, and there's a lot of people who are financially bereft, you know, they suffered financially for different things, and financial help is a good thing. And it's great. It's great knowing that there’s backing there.

Jude: And through the work you do, and keeping Patsy’s story alive, what do you think his legacy is?

Kathleen: Well, his legacy is his grandchildren, you know, that's the way I look at it. He wasn't alive ever to see his grandchildren. He wasn't allowed to walk his daughter up the aisle, which was bad. But his legacy is as well, I think - I've had confirmation from people who were serving time at the time of Patsy’s death. And when they heard about what happened to Patsy, it turned them against the organisation they were in, and I've had people coming to me and saying, ‘It was Patsy’s death that turned me towards doing this and that and the other’, doing good work out in the community, working within the peace and reconciliation sector, and there's so many people's lives have changed because of Patsy’s death: changed for the better. And that’s, to me - who else can say that? You know, I've been stopped in the street by someone saying, ‘I’ve waited a long time to talk to you and I need to tell you this’, and it’s some man telling me that it was Patsy’s death that changed his life around, and I just think to myself, ‘My God’, you know, ‘that's unbelievable’, and that's a great legacy to leave, but then I look at his grandchildren and I think they are too.

Jude: And Kathleen we started the chat by you sharing about home and how important that was to you. In the work that you do and the society you're trying to build towards, what sort of home do you want your grandkids to grow up in? What are your hopes for that?

Kathleen: Well, just generally have a happy life and have their parents with them as long as possible, and we had a wee miracle baby a year ago. I'm gonna cry when I'm telling you about it. My eldest son, who is 47, and his wife was 44, had no family and I was invited down for dinner one Sunday and I was told they were pregnant. And Cassie was born on 10th of December. So it was a year past on the 10th of December, because she was born the day before I had my bad fall, and I was lucky that I was actually at the hospital the day she was born. She was born Letterkenny, and I went to the hospital to see the mammy and the baby because I wasn’t able to see her after that, because I was in rehab for eight weeks after my surgery, and we checked out of it a week before lockdown, which was unbelievable. And my Patrick and his wife just dotes on her. I mean, they all dote on their wee ones, I'm not saying they don’t, but she is one that we never thought we would have.

Jude: It’s a gorgeous story and it's a lovely family miracle, so deserving of the tears. 

Kathleen:I told you I was going to cry. 

Jude: Oh bless you. Kathleen, thank you so much for sharing with me. Your honesty and integrity and grit and strength are amazing. So I really appreciate that. Thank you so much. 

Kathleen: More than welcome, so you are. Thanks, Jude. 

Jude: Thank you, Kathleen.