Fionnbar Walsh appears on Ireland AM to discuss Donal’s legacy as Adam Clayton talks mental health.

Tuesday 6th, 17:03pm

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Sharon McHugh
TV3 PRESS OFFICE
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publicity@tv3.ie

Ciara Byrne
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IMMEDIATE: Tuesday 6th May, 2014.

Fionnbar Walsh appears on Ireland AM to discuss Donal’s legacy as Adam Clayton talks mental health.

Fionnbar, father of the late Donal Walsh, appeared on Ireland AM this morning to speak about his book ‘Donal's Mountain – How One Son Inspired a Nation’, celebrating Donal’s life and raising money for the Donal Walsh #Livelife Foundation.

U2 bassist Adam Clayton also appeared on the TV3 breakfast show to speak about his involvement in the 'Walk in My Shoes' campaign. Adam revealed that he is a recovering alcoholic.

Ireland AM airs Monday to Friday from 7am – 10.45am on TV3.

Click here to view Fionnbar Walsh’s interview on 3Player.

Click here to view Adam Clayton’s interview on 3player.

Fionnbar Walsh appeared on Ireland AM this morning, almost one year on from the tragic death of his son Donal. The inspirational teenager battled with terminal cancer and shared his struggle with the world to highlight suicide and mental illness in teenagers, as well as the lack of facilities for terminally ill teenagers in Ireland. Today, his father Fionnbar, joined Mark Cagney and Sinead Desmond to discuss Donal’s legacy and the release of his book ‘Donal's Mountain – How One Son Inspired a Nation.’

“We’re doing quite well. Look we got the chance to say goodbye that’s probably the biggest thing that we got. He was sentenced but the sentence, you know there was a time-frame that we knew was going to happen. He extended that way beyond what the doctors expected but it was something that we knew was going to happen.”

Fionnbar revealed that he had to re-write the second half of the book after leaving his laptop on top of the roof of the car and driving off. He also described the process of writing the book and how it actually helped him get over milestones.

“Writing the book, funnily enough, was easy because you can get up and walk away when you’re writing it. If it gets too emotional you can walk away from it for a while and take a break but because of the time-frame with this thing, and because of the schedules and the tight time-framing, re-reading and doing the proofreading, that was hard. That was emotional because I had to do it within two and a half, three days.”

Donal’s family set up the Donal Walsh #Livelife Foundation to bring forward his causes of providing age appropriate teenage facilities in hospital and hospice centres as well as promoting his anti-suicide message. For further information, please visit: www.donalwalshlivelife.org

Also appearing on Ireland AM and speaking about mental health was U2 bassist Adam Clayton. He is an ambassador for the ‘Walk in my shoes’ campaign which supports mental health services at St Patrick's Hospital in Dublin. Adam spoke to Anna Daly about his battle with alcohol.

“I’m an alcoholic in recovery so that’s what I discovered but certainly in the early years, I found that music soothed those feelings of inadequacy and discomfort and later on alcohol took over and I had to deal with that.

“From years of battling with something that I didn’t know what it was, once I took alcohol out of the equation my life got better.”

Adam said that if he could give people battling with their mental health one piece of advice, it would be to seek help in whatever form they can whether it be calling a helpline or visiting you GP.

He also spoke about how U2 is back in studio recording their 13th album and are hoping to release it this summer.

For further information, please visit: www.walkinmyshoes.ie

Click here to view Fionnbar Walsh’s interview on 3Player.

Click here to view Adam Clayton’s interview on 3player.

Ireland AM airs Monday to Friday from 7am – 10.45am on TV3.

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ENDS

For further information
Ciara Byrne – Press Officer – 01 419 3329/087 319 9732

Jean O’Donovan – Press & Publicity Assistant – 01 419 3428

Sharon McHugh – Head of Press & Publicity – 087 922 4143

publicity@tv3.ie
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