DeirdreODonovan's Blog

Today has been a nightmare. My daughter cried herself to sleep because she doesn’t want me to be a County Councillor anymore and my dad is in hospital waiting on an angiogram. I completely understand my little girl's stance – at least three nights a week I'm not home until 10.30pm, but my delayed return this evening had everything to do with my dad. He’s your typical GAA-loving...

In late July, we were on our two weeks holidays in sunny West Cork – my hard-working hubby, the two kids and myself were renting a house, as we do every year. But what’s completely different about this year is that as a County Councillor, I am never off the clock. I remember one gloriously sunny day when the kids couldn’t wait to hit the beach to build sandcastles, surf and hunt for crabs...

I have finally figured out why women don’t get involved in politics. Or more specifically mothers. Today I got up, got the two kids ready, made lunches, made breakfast, got kids out, put on a wash while putting on my face while eating toast. Then it was up to the school to do shared reading, met a constituent at 9.30am, left at 10.15am to meet another constituent but was stopped by a lady...

For some of us, becoming a mum is not the blissful experience we expect. I’ll never forget the day we took our son home, nine years ago. As we left the hospital with our little bundle of joy, we both kind of stopped and hovered at the entrance - wasn’t someone going to step in and point out that we had no idea what we were doing? No one would let me sit in a car for the first time and drive...