Celebrity chef Neven Maguire opened up about how some "dark moments" during his childhood sparked his TV stardom.
The Cavan born cookbook author recalled how a bleak winter spent isolated in hospital suffering from jaundice helped him find his drive for a better life.
In 1987 the restaurant owner was rushed from Sligo to Dublin’s Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital in Crumlin with an infection on his liver.
Recalling the three months spent in the hospital ward over Christmas, he said: “It was a lonesome time which I’ve never forgotten.
“I had to be isolated for a week or two because I got an infection in my liver which meant no one could visit me.
“There were dark moments you bury in the back of your mind.”
The 44-year-old told RTE Guide: “That experience made me focus on what I really wanted to do in life.”
“That was an awakening for me. “I was not in a good place but i knew that there was a light at the end of the tunnel.
“I knew that the bad times would pass.”
“I was lying in that bed, very sick, my parents coming up from Cavan visiting me.
Describing the time during his schooling days as an ‘awakening’, he said it taught him from an early age not to take life for granted.
He said: “I realised in that moment I needed to knuckle down.
“I had been messing around in school, going nowhere, to be honest.
“I had to repeat that year and that made me even more determined to do something with my life.”
“I become more focused. I simply had to work hard and enjoy what I did and I had a plan.
“I knew that cooking was for me, what I wanted to do with my life.”
Meanwhile, opening up about other difficult moments in his life, he admitted this Christmas is going to be bittersweet for his family, after the death of his beloved mother-in-law, Eileen, this summer.
The dad of seven year old twins Connor and Lucia said: “Christmas will be a bit bittersweet, I know that Amelda and I will be heartbroken.”
“Over the years, Eileen gave me some great advice, as she did in her final days.
“She told me to enjoy my life with my family, to always have time for each other.”
