My Wedding Day: Veronica Guerin strong-armed me into making my bridal speech

It was a 12pm wedding, so very early. I spent the night before the wedding in my parents’ house in Millstreet, which is about 70km from the city.

Despite the fact that I had quite the journey up — it was probably an hour and a half in the car because we had an old vintage car — I was early for my wedding. 

Matt puts that down to the fact that I was afraid that if I wasn’t there early he might leave, so I made sure there was no way he could back out!

I must have been up at the crack of dawn. But, 30 years ago, it wasn’t the production it is today. I did my own makeup and my own hair. 

My sisters were my bridesmaids, and they helped me to get dressed in the morning. We had some champagne in the house. I stuck on my own veil and traipsed myself out to the car.

My only job that morning was to get my father out the door, and it was a job alright getting him into the car.

I was certainly anxious to get going and he was taking his time.

I was also bringing my bag with me, my overnight bag for the hotel, but also my bag for the honeymoon.

So, in retrospect, I was extremely well organised. I absolutely loved my dress. It was the very first dress I tried on. I tried on about another 3,000 dresses after that and then went back to that first one.

It was by the designer Kathy De Stafford, she’s still on the go on Exchequer St in Dublin. It was by far the most expensive item I’ve ever bought in my entire life.

We had about 180 guests at the wedding. And, if it wasn’t the first, it was certainly one of the first weddings we’d ever been to. We were the first of our friends to get married.

We were also the first in our families — Matt is an only child, and I’m the eldest. When we were organising the wedding, we had absolutely nothing to compare it to.

We asked very few questions. We took everything in good faith. There was no antics, because we didn’t know that you could create antics.

I mean, I never saw the wedding cake before the day — we were lucky there, as Matt’s dad was a confectioner and he made a beautiful cake.

We didn’t even know we had to pick a song for a first dance. 

My uncle had booked the band for us — the Cork City Jazz Band — and, when they came on the stage, one of them whispered to find out what our first song was. We were absolutely stunned. We said “we don’t have one”.

We still laugh when we think about it, but they played a song called something like I Remember the First Time I Saw Her. It’s not a song anyone in their right mind would choose.

It was all so casual that I think we booked the disco the night before the wedding. That night I suddenly thought: “I wonder do we have a disco booked?”

I rang Matt and he had to book the disco then at that stage. Then my mother said to me later that night: “You know, Aileen, your father has no speech written and there’s no chance to get him to write a speech.”

So I had to ring Matt again and ask him would he write a speech for my father? So Matt wrote my father’s speech.

Matt, being the raconteur, made a very good speech. I was reluctant to do a speech myself, but the late Veronica Guerin was one of our wedding guests, and she said: “Aileen, you are going to do a wedding speech?”

She essentially strong-armed me into making a speech. It was a short speech where my main point was congratulating Matt on his bravery in marrying me.

Matt’s father was quite elderly at the time, and a lovely memory we have from the day is when he got up on stage — and I’d never heard sing before — but he sang This Is My Beautiful Day, and it was so lovely.

He died before our first child was even born. We were all enjoying the day so much, and everyone was up dancing all night. They were fighting to get up on stage with the band.

These are all people who love a bit of attention. They couldn’t get enough of dancing and had to be the centre of attention themselves, but it was that kind of fun wedding. 

And it was 5.30am or 6am by the time we went to bed. We made the most of our day.

• Aileen Hickie is the chief executive officer at Parentline.
• Parentline is the national helpline offering support, information, and guidance to parents in confidence and without judgement. 
• Call Parentline 01-8733500 or visit the website parentline.ie.