Gary Speed's widow marries property developer who helped her after tragic loss

Gary Speed's widow Louise married her long-term partner Quinton Bird at a ceremony at Peckforton Castle in Cheshire last week.

The divorced dad-of-three property developer, 52, helped Louise, 51, cope with her loneliness following the tragic death of the former Premier League footballer.

The couple have been running the Bow Property Development company for the last six years in Chester.

Guests included Match of the Day pundit Alan Shearer, who played alongside Speed at Newcastle between 1998 and 2004.

The Wales international starred for Leeds, Everton, Newcastle, Bolton and Sheffield United during a glittering 20-year career.

Speed made more than 900 professional appearances for club and country and lifted the top-flight title with Leeds in 1992.

He moved into management with Sheffield United and Wales before tragically taking his own life in November 2011, aged 42.

Speed and Louise were just 15 when they went on their first date together in the eighties.

She opened up about her loss last month, the 10th anniversary of her husband's passing.

"It was like being in the worst nightmare possible," she said in a brave interview. "There were no answers and no Gary walking through the door again.

"Nothing was ever going to be right again. I was trudging through life, just functioning. If I could have been anybody else apart from me, for a long time, I would have happily taken it.

"But we are 10 years on now. It's a cliché but time is a healer even if it takes years. I have learned that life can be good again, can be great again.

"I don't think you move on from something like this as the same person. I have become wiser. I am probably more confident than I was.

"But I tend to wear a body of armour around me the whole time, if I am honest - so that I cannot be hurt again.

"I know as we go through life different things hit us and I actually think that I deal with things OK now. Nothing fazes me or scares me anymore.

"I don't know if that body of armour has developed over time or whether I deliberately put it on at some point. All I know is that it is there now and it wasn't 10 years ago.

"I just want to protect myself from life. I don't want to feel or go through anything like that ever again. I hope that makes sense."

Speed suffered with depression throughout his adult life and wrote a letter expressing suicidal thoughts as a 17-year-old but never sent it.

"That was the first I knew of it," added Louise. "But my conclusion is that to do what Gary did you must be unwell in your mind.

"He couldn't talk, didn't want to talk. He had all the opportunity through people like the League Managers Association."

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