Marty Whelan has spoken out about the 'horrendous time' in his life when he found himself unemployed and on the dole.
Speaking to RTÉ TEN the popular radio and TV presenter said: "The dole office was a horrendous time in my life, but it had to be done."
Whelan's career blossomed during ten key years with RTÉ Radio 2 (now known as RTÉ 2fm), beginning with the station in 1979. "Then I went out and did whatever," he says, referring to the much-publicised and pondered move to Century Radio.
When Century closed unexpectedly, after a relatively brief life, Whelan, by then a father to baby Jessica, found himself unemployed and on the dole.
"The one thing I discovered writing my book, which didn’t occur to me in advance, was that you bring it all to life, you bring the stuff back – that didn’t occur to me," revealed Whelan.
"I thought I would just remember it and say, 'here it is, and this is what happened.' But yeah, I remembered the stuff and some of it quite vividly and, yeah, it was upsetting."
Marty Whelan's memoir, That's Life, is out now.
