'My baby was the last one to die in Bessborough'

Pregnant in Bessborough in 1994, Cindi Bonny vowed to resist the pressure to put her second child up for adoption. But, tragically, her daughter was born six weeks premature and died just two days later. Getty file photo

Zoei Bonny was two days old when she died on Wednesday, August 10, 1994. She was the last baby to be registered as dying in the care of Bessborough mother and baby home in Cork and, almost 27 years on, her mother mourns her still.

“I think about Zoei all the time, every day,” says Cindi Bonny, who lives now in Carrigaline, Co Cork. “The years go by, but you never, ever get over the pain or the loss. You just learn to live with it.”