'It broke my heart': Úna Crawford O'Brien on Bryan Murray moving to full-time care

Una Crawford O’Brien: "I think it was probably the hardest decision I've ever had to make because I really thought I could cope. And I knew I was a strong person." Picture: Maxwells.

Actor Bryan Murray has moved to full-time care amid his Alzheimer's battle, his partner and fellow Fair City star Úna Crawford O'Brien confirmed.

Murray was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2019, but continued to appear on Fair City before going public with his story in 2022 to raise awareness of the disease and to help others.

Known for playing Carrigstown's Bob Charles for two decades, Murray first appeared on Fair City in 2005, and retired from the soap at the end of April last year.

Since then, his illness has progressed, and he is now in full-time care in a nursing home, Crawford O'Brien told Miriam O’Callaghan on RTÉ Radio 1’s Sunday with Miriam.

She explained that his illness had “galloped” in the last year, leading to what she described as "the hardest decision I've ever had to make".

“Last year was a disaster. His illness galloped, is the only way I can describe it. And the decision had to be made that Bryan would go into a nursing home,” she said.

The Lord Mayor of Dublin, Emma Blain, singer Daniel O’Donnell and actors Úna Crawford O’Brien and Bryan Murray pictured at the launch of Alzheimer’s Tea Day in 2025. Picture: Leon Farrell / Photocall Ireland.

“I think it was probably the hardest decision I've ever had to make because I really thought I could cope. And I knew I was a strong person. I had survived my daughter dying, and I thought if I could survive that, I could survive anything. So I was determined to look after Bryan myself, but I just couldn’t in the end.” 

When asked if there was a moment in particular that had led her to make that decision, she said: “It wasn’t any one thing…. It was just a continuous build-up. Every day was different.

“You could never plan what would be good one day, would be bad the next. And Bryan’s mood, as I say, changed. He was always so good-humoured. Now, he would get very angry with me. When he would talk to me, I didn’t know if the right answer would be yes or if it would be no, and so I was walking on eggshells all the time.” 

She said that even though she knew it was the right decision, it broke her heart to make it.

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“Everybody who was seeing him regularly knew it was the only thing to do and that was very reassuring for me, even though it broke my heart,” she said.

She said that even though she does not believe that he knows who she is when she visits him, that he is always smjiling and in good spirits again.

“His mood has changed completely again, and he’s in great form all the time and he will smile when I come in, but then he smiles at everybody, and I’ll say, ‘It’s Úna’ and he’ll go, ‘Yes, yes’.” 

She said that when she brings their dog Bob to visit, he does not know him at first, but that he’ll call him by his name when on a walk.

“He doesn’t know the dog when I bring Bob in to see him but if we’re out walking, he’ll take the lead and at some stage he’ll say, 'Come on Bob, come on.’ That’s the only person that he calls by name now,” she said.