We’re on a family night out. And where else would you go but up North?

Being away together, even for a night, is just magic. The idea and the reality. There were many times when we were not just in sheer terror and fear and shock and awe thinking that we might loose Pádraig, we were also split up between Dublin and Hamburg because there was not adequate treatment for Pádraig available in Dublin.

Back then, we were not sure how much of his life, how much of our life would continue, could go on.

Today, I am pretty worn out, weather-beaten, raw inside from wounds that will never heal, but determined and focused and hopeful that Pádraig will continue to have a life worth living and that he will show us the way we need to go to support him and those like him.

Today we are all together, the whole family, in a nice hotel and lovely surroundings, enjoying ‘a night out’.

I’d never had thought I’d be so happy to be up North!