{"id":10643,"date":"2025-08-20T02:32:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T02:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/10643\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T02:32:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T02:32:09","slug":"he-was-my-hero-says-dad-as-he-paid-emotional-tribute-to-son-21-at-his-funeral-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/10643\/","title":{"rendered":"He was my hero says dad as he paid emotional tribute to son (21) at his funeral service"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\" data-testid=\"title-summary\">Leitrim resident David O\u2019Callaghan cremated after funeral service in County Cavan\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Mr O\u2019Callaghan, who had been living in Rooskey, County Leitrim, was remembered as \u2018a wonderful man\u2019 who was \u2018loved by everyone\u2019 after his recent passing at the age of 21.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">At his funeral service, his father, David O\u2019Callghan Snr, paid tribute to his son, describing him as his \u2018hero\u2019 and \u2018best friend\u2019. <\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">\u201cDavid was the most honest person I&#8217;ve ever known. He would do anything for anybody. He would take the shirt off his back and bend over backwards to help anybody. David was the glue that held his family together and we are all truly devastated that he felt he had to leave this world so young.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">\u201cDavid could see us all today and see how much his family and friends truly loved him, he would have loved it. Today is where I let go of not only my son, but my best friend. Once he called me his hero without a cape, and in truth he was my hero. As a father, I was supposed to teach him things which I did, but he also taught me an awful lot too.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The Boyle area was searched for several days after Mr O\u2019Callaghan went missing. The search was stood down last Wednesday evening after his body was recovered.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Mr O\u2019Callaghan Snr said: \u201cI wish as every parent does, that a mom or dad goes before their child. One last thing to say to everybody here today is to talk to your family. Don&#8217;t fight over stupid things, look out for signs that I never saw because it&#8217;s a bad thing that a tragedy like this brings families together.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Mr O\u2019Callaghan reposed at Shepherd\u2019s Funeral Home in County Longford Longford on  (Monday, August 18) before his remains were cremated at Lakelands Crematorium, County Cavan, following his funeral service on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">He is survived by his mother Noeleen Thomas and father David O\u2019Callaghan Snr, brothers and sisters Gavin, Megan, Cody, Zara, Milan, Kyah, Ben, Bradley, his partner Leanne, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews, extended family and friends.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom5 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">If you have been affected by issues in this article, Pieta can be contacted on by calling 1800 247 247 or texting \u2018HELP\u2019 to 51444, while Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leitrim resident David O\u2019Callaghan cremated after funeral service in County Cavan Mr O\u2019Callaghan, who had been living in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10644,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,8051,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-10643","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-latest-news","17":"tag-latestnews","18":"tag-main-news","19":"tag-mainnews","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-oisin-mcgovern","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10643\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}