Can I forgive Gary? I don’t know. It’s caused us so much hurt. But, of course, I want to

Ten years after Gary Speed’s shocking death, his widow Louise gives a candid interview — and reveals how she and their sons are finally finding acceptance

LOUISE SpEEd is sitting on a cream sofa in her beautiful house near Chester. Her fouryear-old cockapoo Alfie is at her feet. Outside, just beyond the garden fence, two pheasants compete for territory. It is a beautiful late autumn day.

But for Louise this is always the worst month of the year and this is always the very worst week. It is the anniversary of her husband Gary’s passing. Gary Speed, the boy-next-door footballer so many people inside and outside the game loved and admired. It has been 10 years now and Louise has found a way to live again, to once again feel happiness and joy.

There will never be answers explaining why Gary — manager of his beloved Wales at the time — took his own life the morning after a night spent with friends in November 2011. But Louise has found a place to lodge the pain and the sheer sense of disbelief that inevitably endures.

Usually at this time of year she disappears. Often to New York where her and Gary’s two sons, Eddie and Tommy, are studying. But always somewhere. This year, though, she has chosen to sit down and talk.

‘I know this weekend is significant for people because it’s the 10th anniversary,’ Louise tells Sportsmail. ‘But it’s not for me. It’s no different to the previous nine years. I always remember

I was 41 when it happened and it felt so young to have that label as a widow

Gary on his birthday in September. That’s when I have a drink to him. That’s my day of thought and celebration of Gary.

‘But the anniversary is always different. It’s there, it’s looming and I dread it. All of November is a non-event month for me. I just can’t wait for the month to disappear.’

Time spent with Louise Speed is life-affirming. Her story is one of almost unimaginable trauma but also of recovery and discovery. There are some tears during our morning together but also much laughter.

She is 51 now and has rebuilt her life and her sense of self from the dreadful two years that immediately followed Gary’s death.

That was a time when she struggled to get off the sofa and felt smothered by a cloak of universal sympathy. For a long time, alcohol was a crutch she leant on heavily. No longer.

‘I was 41 when it happened and it felt so young to have that label as a widow,’ she says.

‘It felt very uncomfortable. people were so kind but sometimes it just took one look.

‘I was almost caught in a barbed wire situation where that was all I felt. I was in this pigeon hole of pity and sympathy.

‘It was like being in the worst nightmare possible. 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 cliche but time is a healer even if it takes years. I have learned that life can be good again, can be great again.

‘I feel different in myself. I still feel many things but not right in front of my face. I know it. I am Gary’s widow and I can say it now. I think of him every single day. It could just be a flashback or I will see something and wonder how he would react to it. Most often now it’s nice thoughts. I have myself back and the boys have all of their mum back. Back then I felt they had lost their dad and only had half a mum.

‘It was not fair on them above all. They had lost such a chunk of me as well. But it has come back now. They have me back.’

LOUISE’S first date with 15-yearold Gary was at the local tennis club in Hawarden, Flintshire, but he forgot to bring his racket. So instead they walked and talked.

‘Lots of the girls fancied him,’ she smiles. ‘He was a good-looking boy. I was probably one of the ones who thought he was “all right”. playing it cool!

‘He was quite a shy boy but through other people he asked me out. Like you do that at age. By the third person asking me I was like: “OK then I will...”

‘We had a lovely walk and even then he was saying he would like a nice home and be able to fish in his garden. He said he would like to be able to bring up children in a nice place. They were his values even back then and they never ever changed. He was modest and humble. Grounded.

‘When I think of him I think of us as a family. Him with the boys. Holidays. Him practising the guitar. The same chords over and over and me having to listen!

‘The good times I remember are not necessarily the football but family life. The football obviously was his world and his career and he was devoted to it. But I enjoyed Gary at his best when football was not properly involved.’

For 20 years, Louise gave herself to Gary’s career. She moved to Leeds where he won the old division One title under Howard Wilkinson and they married. She followed him back to the North West to Everton and then to Newcastle. Speed played his later football at Bolton and finally Sheffield United.

Louise was uncomplaining but hankered after something