I'm Gearard, and I'm raising money to help me fulfil a promise I made to my Da' before he passed away.

I promised to complete his dream and renovate a derelict cottage in Ireland we bought for his retirement.

Being from Dublin, and coming to England to find work at the tender age of 13, it was always his dream to retire back 'home' to the Irish countryside.

We found a place in the Southeast of Ireland that was perfect.

It was rundown and needed a fair bit of work.

Work which I, Dad and my brother Colum could do together.

We started the work, but there was a turn of events that changed the plan.

On his way home after a pint one night, Colum, my brother, was viciously attacked and mugged by a group of lads.

The attack was severe enough, that although he was rushed to the hospital, they had left him blind.

My Dad had always had Colum 'under his wing'.

They had always worked together on building sites. When my Dad got on a new site, he always got Colum a job too.

It was time for my Dad to take Colum under his wing again as he was rehabilitated to cope with life being blind.

My Dad never got over what happened with Colum. Unfortunately, he was never the same man again.

From that point on, he would spend almost every day with Colum. He became Column's eyes so to speak, and the project in Ireland fell by the wayside.

Fast forward to 2018.

My Dad had a small yard with a workshop where he and Col used to tinker with things.

Boats had become something they were interested in and they would buy a run-down river cruiser, make it slightly better and sell it hoping to make a few quid.

Over the years, they had become friendly with the old lady that lived next to the yard.

She used to live with her brother, but since his passing, she was finding the house too much to manage.

After some persuasion, my brother sold his house and bought the house next to the yard.

It needed a bit of work, but they could do that together. The old man's swan song as he was well into his 70's.

Over the next 18 months, they worked every day doing it up.

What we didn't know was our Dad was harbouring a secret.

He'd been diagnosed with bowel cancer.

He didn't tell any of us and carried that burden alone for the next 18 months until it became apparent that there was something seriously wrong.

I can remember going to Colum's to see him, and my heart sank at the amount of weight he'd lost. Colum didn't know as he couldn't see.

I confronted him and in his Irish brogue told us 'I've got cancer'. I remember almost collapsing...

The next few weeks were a series of appointments, with the last one being at the hospital just before Christmas, where he was discharged into palliative care.

We spent the next 6 weeks taking turns nursing him at Colum's place.

Time for us to pay him back and take him under our wing.

During that time, as he grew closer to passing, we talked in depth about what he wanted regarding his funeral etc.

One day, during my 'shift' to look after him, he had me make a promise to him, a promise to 'fix that house in Ireland'.

I made him and myself that promise.

It took me some time to get back to Ireland.

COVID hit the world and travelling became difficult.

I managed to get over in 2022 to discover the little house was in a terrible state.

Since then I've been traveling back and forth.

I've dug it from a swamp and clawed it back from Mother Nature.

It's a huge task and one that some thought was a fool's errand. But I've done the impossible, got the water of the land and cleared it off.

It's becoming apparent that although I'm prepared to sink everything I have into the renovation, I may come up short financially.

The price of materials is shocking, which is why I'm asking for help.

I plan to bring the cottage up to standard, nothing fancy or big.

I want to keep the same little cottage but know it will need completely refurbishing.

I've no idea exactly how much as I will do as much of the work myself, and also call on all the favours I can.

Here are some of the things any donations will go to;

As you can see, it's a big list and that's only a snippet.

I've made good progress already, and have tonnes of following along on social media, watching as things go.

Any donations would be really helpful, as I'm sure there are things I've not even accounted for so far.

Just one thing is sure, I am going to keep that promise, and if you can give me a leg up to do that, then fair play to you.