Boyzone star Ronan Keating opens up about co-parenting three children with ex Yvonne Connolly and reveals marrying her may not have been best decision
He said his current wife Storm helps keep it all together for 19-year-old Jack, Missy, 17, and Ali, 12
RONAN Keating has admitted sharing custody of his three older children can be “very, very tricky”.
The Boyzone singer also told how he has risen above Louis Walsh’s “sniggering” jibes and finally begun “loving each day as if it’s your last”.
Opening up about family life, he credited current wife Storm, 36, for helping to keep it all together for 19-year-old Jack, Missy, 17, and Ali, 12 — as well as their own son, Cooper, who turns one later this month.
Ro reflected on how his 1998 marriage to Yvonne, just two months after his mother Marie had died from cancer, may not have been his best decision.
He said: “It’s a fragile time, I’d a very, very close relationship with my mum and I guess you lean on people when you come out of a situation like that — you look for strength in other people.
“And I definitely did that, it’s a decision you make at the time. Not necessarily the right one, but it’s the decisions you make when you’re at your weakest like that.”
The pair gave their marriage another go after Ronan’s affair with dancer Francine Cornell in 2009, but finally called time on it two years later.
Speaking about co-parenting, he said: “It’s very, very very, very tricky, it’s a very difficult thing. We are lucky, I have three amazing children (with Yvonne) that blow my mind — the stuff that they deal with — and they are brilliant.”
He added: “Storm is incredible. She welcomed those kids with open arms, and those kids are hers as much as they are mine.
“I have a crazy schedule, all the time busy, but she manages to go, ‘OK, we need to be in Dublin this weekend’ or ‘they need to be over here, we’re on holidays here, this is when we are all going to be together’.
“She makes that work — that happens because Storm makes that happen. I would be useless without that. This wouldn’t work like it works.
“It’s tricky at times, navigating all of it, and it has to be handled with gloves at times. But I’m very lucky with three amazing children that understand what they’re dealing with and the world they are in.”
Ro admitted: “It wouldn’t be easy all the time — but you try for the children always to just remain calm and get through it.
“You’ve got to always remain in an adult state of mind so that you can deal with it. There’s times when I get very angry, very frustrated and you really have to bottle that, you’ve got to protect the children always.
“Raising those children from separate places, two separate views . . . once that breaks down your opinions change and your version of events changes, so you have to be able to manage that and to make sure the children are the priority.”
Now aged 41, Ronan was only 16 when Louis Walsh put him in Boyzone, and the group rapidly went from “a little white transit van doing nightclubs” to “private jets, five-star hotels”.
Looking back on those early days of fame, he said: “I took myself way too seriously, my first six years in particular. And in my years as a solo artist, because I wanted to be the best version of myself.
“When I leave a room they don’t talk ill of me, because that’s the way my mother raised me. I didn’t want to be tabloid fodder, I didn’t want to embarrass people, family. So I was as professional as I could be.
“I should have let my hair down, I should have drank more, I should have partied more, I should have thrown more strops.
“Forget about the strops, but I should have just had a good time.
“I’ve a 19-year-old son, Jack, and that’s what I say to him — have fun. Enjoy yourself. Don’t settle down. Wait until your 30s before you consider it.”
For Ro, the pivotal moment in his life came in October 2009 when band mate Stephen Gately died during a holiday in Majorca.
He said: “I changed a lot when Stephen died. I definitely started living a lot more and enjoying myself and, excuse the pun, loving each day as if it’s your last.
“I mean, it’s really true because you never know.”
Stephen’s death also marked a new start with Keith Duffy, Mikey Graham and Shane Lynch.
Ro explained: “It shocked all the band, I think it pulled us a lot closer together. We drifted very far apart in the years we were apart and losing Steo brought us together again.
“The four of us together felt like he was in the room so I think that’s why we wanted to be together more.”
While the Boyz grew closer, Ronan had a famous falling out with former manager Louis, who called him a “karaoke artist”, “talentless” and “spoiled”.
Ro refused to hit back at the time, and told Natalie Pinkham on her In the Pink podcast that he has no regrets that he never “stood up for himself”.
He said: “I’m grateful for the chance Louis gave me, for where it led me. But I don’t think for a second he can say he’s ungrateful for what I did for him.
“I helped him get to where he is today, because of what I gave the band and him as a manager. So it’s a two-way street that.
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“I could have stood up for myself more but it’s not my style to do that in public, I don’t like public spats.
“So Louis had lots to say about me — sniggering silly little stupid things, childish — but I didn’t retort because I thought why would I bother. I’m not interested in it, it’s small fry stuff.
“I don’t regret the fact that I didn’t say anything, My mother always said rise above it, and that’s what I try to do.”
The Life is a Rollercoaster singer added: “They say every dog has his day, so it’s fine, the wheel always turns