SAD NEWS: BBC Breakfast turns EMOTIONAL as presenters Rachel Burden and Roger Johnson deliver HEARTBREAKING NEWS of man trying to carry out son’s ‘DYING WISH’
BBC Breakfast turned emotional as hosts Rachel Burden and Roger Johnson spoke to grieving father and former Sky News journalist Mike McCarthy, who was attempting to carry out his son’s “dying wish”.
Mike appeared on the programme in a desperate bid to raise awareness for mental health and suicide, after his son Ross tragically took his own life at age 31.
In a final farewell letter, Ross requested that his family campaign for “better support.” Speaking about his son on-air became all too much for Mike at one point, as he wiped away tears in the moving moment.
Not wanting to let his son down, Mike is devoting all of his energy to fulfilling that final wish. Mike was sitting on the red sofa with a Baton of Hope, which he explained represented a “journey of hope—of moving bravely away from the darkness of despair and, with encouragement and support.”
Mike is leading an epic event in memory of his son and others who have lost their lives to suicide. The Baton will travel across the UK, stopping at 20 different locations. The charitable event will start tomorrow in Blackpool, and BBC Breakfast will cover its journey until it finishes in London on 10 October.
Speaking to Rachel and Roger about the community he had built alongside other people in deep moments of sadness. Mike bravely said: “I say to people whom I have met, who have lost people to suicide, ‘I wish I had never met you, but I am glad that we did’. Because in another world we wouldn’t have met, and I’d go back to that world in the blink of an eye, but I’ve met some incredible people.”
Mike also spoke about three other fathers who had also tragically lost their children to suicide, and they created the campaign 3 Dads Walking, with the trio aiming to raise awareness together “one step at a time”.
They came together through grief with the same shared ambition to prevent suicide, especially in young people. The trio will be reuniting to share a lap together with the Baton of Hope.
Speaking about their connection, Mike said, “I mean, the 3 Dads, again, advanced the cause so effectively. Doing something practical was a Baton of Hope, and we wanted to do something practical.”
He added, “Awareness is as good as the practical change that follows.”
Mike became incredibly emotional at one point during the interview, when he addressed the letter his son Ross “had left for him” and how “rewarding it felt to have been having a positive effect” in the workplace now.
He said: “We’ve introduced what we’d call a workplace pledge, in which we provide suicide prevention in the workplace for companies large and small and that has really taken off and its rewarding to see that the letter that Ross left for me, that there was something that I could do to answer what was effectively his dying wish.”
Mike became visbly upset as Rachel stepped in to offer comfort: “Ross would be incredibly proud of what you’re doing and thank you for sharing his story with us, we apprecaite it,” he bowed his head and began to cry, realising he’d achieved so much throughout his own suffering and grief.
