The mother of a teenage boy who died when a cabin cruiser belonging to Lord Louis Mountbatten, the Shadow V, was blown up by the IRA on 27 August 1979, has said she could not even speak to her family after his death.
Paul Maxwell was just 15 when he was killed.
His mother, Mary Hornsey, said her son was very, very close to her and she heard his voice even after he died.
"I could not even speak to my family for about a week. I couldn't utter a word," she said.
"I wanted to crawl under a stone. It was difficult to grasp what was happening. I wanted it all to go away. I just could not cope with it. It was awful."
Speaking on RTÉ's This Week, she said she was thinking very deeply about him and "he seemed to be saying 'what has happened to my strong mother and I cannot rest in peace unless I know that you are okay’".
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"That was it for me and I changed," Ms Hornsey said.
"It was pitch black for some time and I would have said it was hopeless until I felt Paul speaking," she said, before adding it took around three years for her to reach the point of change.
"I wanted to talk about the kind of son I had and the kind of person that he was," Ms Hornsey said.
"I also wanted people to understand how hate and anger can bring about disasters and war.
"Paul was entertaining. When Paul was around there was never a dull moment."
She said she went on to join the Samaritans because she wanted to try and get something positive out of the terrible experience and help others.
Experience with Mountbatten family
She said her family, who lived in Co Fermanagh, had bought a very small cottage in Mullaghmore and used to visit at weekends.
Paul loved boats, she added, and he was very good with them, he had a natural ability and loved the sea.
Ms Hornsey explained her son was asked if he would be interested in working for Lord Mountbatten on the boat and he subsequently got to know Lord Mountbatten's grandchildren.
She said Paul initially did not like Lord Mountbatten "one bit" but started to get along with him.
"He said he was a very nice old man and sometimes he would talk to Paul in the boat about his days in the navy," she said.
She laughed as she recalled how Paul often felt inferior to the Mountbatten children and would pretend he owned the same items such as guns.
"They wore shoes with buckles on them and of course Paul wasn't like that."
'Paul's dead'
She said she was very worried about going to Mullaghmore during the Troubles but her husband was very keen to go.
"I remember I was sitting on the patio of our little cottage on that morning," she said, and the rain had been absolutely awful but on that particular day "the sky was blue and you could hear the skylarks".
"Then all of a sudden there was this great bang, and I immediately said - it's Paul, Paul's dead."
"My husband told me not to be silly but he went down to the harbour and came back and told me, Paul was dead," she said.
"I think I probably fainted and I ended up in the doctor's office," she added.
"I am amazed that I'm still here but I am.
"I just could not believe that human beings could do this to each other," she said, and that the people responsible for the bomb could have seen children getting into that boat.
"I just thought - how could they possibly do that and when I thought about the people who had actually done this, I thought - what are they going to tell their children about this."
'Price for peace'
Ms Hornsey said it is so dreadful to be the mother of a murdered child, but it must be so much worse to be the mother of a person who murdered somebody.
She said it did help her when a man was jailed for life for carrying out the attack and it was a very bitter pill to swallow when he was released under the Good Friday Agreement.
"But it was the price for peace at the time," she said.
"I thought it was too much a price for me," she added softly.
Ms Hornsey, who still volunteers and give talks with the South East Fermanagh Foundation, which supports victims of the Troubles, said she wants her son to be remembered and for people to understand that it is possible to go on if they can "accept the great grief that they have".
"Happiness and grief are two sides of the same coin," she said, "and I always remember the happiness that Paul brought into my life".
"There was a great deal of happiness and that is why I have had grief in my life."
