Imagine agreeing to do Dancing With The Stars just to give your family a laugh. Imagine getting trussed up, tanned down, thrown around and voted on (or off) weekly, on the biggest show on Irish tv, just for your family’s entertainment – would you do it?
Well, Ireland AM’s Elaine Crowley would! For her 11-year-old nephew Ultan who passed away the year before last, Elaine has pushed herself off the breakfast show couch and out of her comfort zone because as she tells us today, “life now has new meaning”.
Today we’re ensconced in The College Green Hotel in Dublin, with Elaine’s four gorgeous nieces. “Losing their nana and their cousin has been hard”, she tells us. “They’ve had a rough couple of years so today I want to spoil them with the VIP treatment!”
So, spoil we did. We had a full day of glam, of makeup and hair and styling, with Izzie, Ella, Maebh and Clodagh, and afterwards, after all the shots were done, Elaine, their lovely aunt, took the girls up the town for food.
One of Elaine’s biggest regrets, she tells us, is never having had a child of her own. Early menopause took that privilege away from her and so these girls are the closest she’ll ever get to having her own children, she says. Luckily there’s a lot of them to go around!
Elaine has 9 living siblings and so between them there are 26 nieces and nephews. Having a big family is a great support when the card falls, she tells us.
In an emotional yet uplifting interview, Elaine tells us about Ultan, about the boy he was and about the legacy he has left.
Elaine, you’re doing it! Finally, they’ve got you onto DWTS!
They have! It is not something I ever imagined myself doing. But as I told you, I’m a changed person in the last year. I am seizing every bit of every day. I’m trying to reap every little bit of joy out of life that I can and if that involves me going on the biggest television show in Ireland, so what! What’s the worst thing that can happen?!
That you don’t enjoy it, and sure that’s not that awful at all! Can you dance, have you any rhythm?
A normal amount of rhythm that anyone might have from throwing themselves around the dance floor when they were young. But in terms of formal dancing, no! Ballet, for a few weeks, but then I grew boobs and I stopped because I was probably too self conscious. I did do a Breast Cancer Fundraiser like 10 years ago, that was only one dance though so nothing like this level.
You’ve surely been asked to take part before?
It’s been suggested to me before. My agents have said it a few times and shall we say, I’ve always shut down the conversation because the thought of dancing in front of people on national television, fills me with utter horror and fear. Terrifies me! But then this year, I just said, feck it!
We’ll get to the feck it bit shortly but firstly, why such fear? Sure, you do live telly already and that’s pretty terrifying, it’s adding the steps in, is it?
I’m grand when I’m in my comfort zone of the TV presenter mode, be that on a stage or in the studio. But if I have to be my own normal self and kind of very vulnerable – terrified! Doing something that you’re not good at makes you very vulnerable. And I haven’t been particularly good at pushing myself out of the ol’ comfort zone. But now I’ve literally shoved myself out of the comfort zone! Now there is no comfort! Oh dear Lord, do I need my head examined?!
Not yet! When you’re presenting the focus is not on you, but now it’s all about you!
And that terrifies me! The whole world could be collapsing around me, but work is work, and my job is my job, and that’s what I do. But this is not my job. It’s something I’m not good at. It’s something I haven’t really done before and I have no control over how this is going to pan out. I’m 47, I am nowhere near fit, my knees are at me, my back is at me!
Well, this is gonna get you fit, fast!
I am always procrastinating about getting fit. But now I have no choice!
So, you’ll get fit and, you’ll have the craic because there’s a great crew involved this year.
Oh, my God, I know I might be a bit biased, but I think it’s the best cast of characters ever put together. It is a stroke of genius, like I would be glued to it if I wasn’t in it! It’s going to be carnage. They’re all bonkers. It’s going to be so much fun.
And what a great fun way to start a new year!
It’s a change and you know what, I need that, along with a bit of excitement. Even if I make an absolute eejit of myself on the dance floor, it’s not the end of the world if I fall on my arse, my partner can help me up. I’m not going into it with that whole, ‘Oh, I need to win this disco ball’. I just hope I have a bit of craic.
Well, this new approach to life and living and to having the craic, comes from the loss of your nephew the year before last. For readers who may not be familiar, tell us about Ultan and about how his loss has impacted you.
My mam died in ’21 and we were kind of just coming to terms with that when Ultan got a pain in his back. The doctors just thought it was a pulled a muscle or something but a couple of weeks later he coughed up blood. He was brought to the hospital, they took an x-ray, they saw a mass, he was brought into Crumlin Children’s Hospital, and that was in April, and he died in August. He had a cancer called NUT carcinoma, which is very rare. I think there might be one other case in Ireland, in an adult. But certainly, I think the chances of survival are slim to none, unless they catch it really, really early, and we missed out on catching it really early, unfortunately, because radical surgery is the only option. We thought for a brief time chemotherapy might shrink it for surgery, but it didn’t happen.
How sad…
We tried everything. I was researching every clinical trial in the universe, the most cutting-edge technologies and I know an awful lot about those technologies as an ambassador for Breast Cancer Ireland. My mam died of cancer, my dad died of cancer, one of my best friends Emma Hannigan died of cancer. And then as I live near Crumlin Children’s Hospital, they stayed with me during treatment and I got to know Ultan really well. But in another way, it kind of opened me up to a hell of a lot more heartbreak. Because he was such a beautiful, bright boy.
What age was he Elaine?
He turned 11 the month before he died, and we had a party for him. He had the best – he still has the best – little brothers, cousins and pals. I mean, they’re such a tight group of kids, and I know people give out about kids nowadays, but not them. I swear to God; they’d teach us all a lesson; the resilience and the most amazing kindness and thoughtfulness and selflessness. I mean, it’s humbled me. It really has humbled me. I’m just pissed off he’s not alive. Our hearts are absolutely shattered. So that’s why I’m literally embracing everything that life can throw at me now. Nothing in this world is a problem anymore, absolutely nothing. I’m not going to be fearful anymore as long as what I do with my life doesn’t hurt anybody else. I don’t mind if I’m doing something to myself with my eyes open, as long as my friends and family are healthy and happy. That’s all I give a shit about now.
Must have been tough on your beautiful nieces who are appearing in these photographs with you today.
It would have been nice to get my nephews there but there’s 22 boys and it would have been hard without Ultan because he was such a little character, he would be wanting to wear all the clothes! But yeah, they are his cousins. Those girls are fabulous. They’re beautiful. Because I went into the menopause early, I didn’t have a relationship and by the time I did, it was too late, unfortunately so, the closest thing I have to children are those little people in my life. I love them with all my heart, and I know it’s not the same as a mother’s love, but an Auntie’s love is fairly solid! I mean, Izzie, Ella, Maebh and Clodagh, I used to change their nappies, I used to nurse them to sleep, and then when you see them all grown up, it’s like, wow, they’re gorgeous. My babies are grown up, but they have had a tough time losing their nana and their cousin. We’ve all had a rough few years, and I just want to cheer them up. And since I told them about DWTS, they haven’t stopped laughing!
Coming from such a big family, has that been a support?
There was 11 born, my older sister died when she was only 10 days old, so 10 of us growing up. But yes, I don’t know what I would do without my sisters. Of course, we kill each other but we are a very united family with great love for each other. There’s a great comfort in having people that love you and have your back. I would die in a second for any of them.
You’ve been very open in the past about your struggle with mental health. Does the loss of a child bring a whole new level of desperation to the world?
I’ve done a lot of work on myself over the years, but what I’ve learned is there’s a huge difference between grief and depression. If I was depressed and this happened, I wouldn’t feel anything. That’s the difference. There’s such a dysphoria. There’s a lack of feeling rather than an abundance of feeling. In one way, it would have been easier to be honest to not have that utter heartbreak, I think. And for a lot of people who have suffered grief and think it’s depression, it’s not. Grief is a very insidious and scary process, it can rob you of your mental and your physical health for a while. I think there is a despair and a despondency with depression, but grief is a different animal. When I had depression, I didn’t care. I didn’t want to see my family for 10 months like they could have lived or died, and it wouldn’t have bothered me in the slightest. Therapy has helped me understand all this.
So you’re able to mind yourself better these days? Is that why you took time off work last summer?
Yeah. Because I was very close to my mother and seeing her and my family suffer, got to me. And then with Ultan…
I just needed the break. I haven’t taken time off since I was 19, I have been more or less full-time since I was 20 years old. I just kind of hit a wall, I just needed to spend time with my family and friends, to reconnect and be around people I love.
You still happy on the Ireland AM couch?
Still happy! I love live TV because you don’t know what the hell is going to happen. I love interviewing people because you don’t know what the hell is going to come out of their mouths! Love the adrenaline rush.
What would you say is your biggest achievement, and also your biggest regret?
My biggest achievement, to be honest, is nothing to do with my career. I think what I’m most proud of doing is looking after my mother when she was dying, it was a very hard thing to do. For me, reading poetry with her in the middle of the night and stuff like that, just being around her, that was the biggest gift and the greatest achievement, because career stuff can come and go. The biggest regret I have is probably not having children. I’d love to know what it would be like to have been a mother because I would have been a good one.
You would have been, Elaine.
I’m very cuddly and cosy! But I’m also a great aunt!
Are you lonely now?
Am I lonely? No, no, I don’t think I’m lonely, not really. Even if I’m by myself I spend half my life on Facetime. I’ve some really, really close friends and a very large family. So, there’s always someone you can hit up for something if you need a good moan. And I should add that having kids, I know, is not easy either. I can sleep when I want. I can do what I want and go where I want. Nobody’s the boss of me! I know from my sisters, between football and hurling and soccer practice and after school study and playdates and washing and laundry and Jesus, Mary and Joseph, they don’t have a second. They must be exhausted all the time, and they are exhausted all the time. And broke! But would anyone swap their kids? No way never!
