I’m always thinking of the wee fella when I’m out swimming. I like to think he’d have wanted to come out with me

He will think of Brett often, and imagines the little boy he describes as fearless, loving wild swimming as much as his dad.

His son, though, was lost in the Dunblane tragedy and, for Colin, swimming in the rivers and lochs of Scotland is a passion that has literally saved his life as he struggled to come to terms with the terrible loss.

Brett was just six years old when he was killed along with 15 of his classmates and his teacher in the primary school shooting in 1996.

In the years that followed, 55- year- old Colin struggled to endure, suffering from post traumatic stress disorder, depression and anger issues.

T h re e years a g o, as the 20th anniversary of his son’s death loomed and a number of personal pressures took their toll, Colin suffered a nervous breakdown.

Medical support helped but, he says, wild swimming around Scotland – a hobby he discovered

‘ There’s nothing that could ever hurt me as much as losing Brett

by chance – brought him back from the brink.

He swims in open water near his home in Alness, Ross- shire, but travels all over Scotland and, he says, thoughts of Brett are never far away.

He said: “I always think of Brett when I’m swimming. What would the wee fella think of this? It’s difficult to imagine what he would be like but I like to think he would have wanted to come with me.

“I feel safer thinking about Brett when I’m out in the water, as if I can deal with what has happened a bit more.

“I also think in a way it makes me braver. There’s nothing that could ever hurt me as much as losing him, so being out wild swimming does not phase me.”

The tone of Colin’s voice grows softer when he talks about his beloved second-born child.

“I think a lot about what he’d be like now, what he’d like to do, where he’d be.

“He was so funny, and so full of life. I had to have eyes in the back of my head when we had him on days out. He was fearless and nothing phased him.

“I remember on one trip to the shows he insisted on going on the ghost train, even though his older brother wasn’t keen.

“He was only five and off he went by himself, and came out of the end laughing his head off. He wasn’t afraid of anything.”

On the day of the tragedy, Colin was due to have Brett and big brother Colin to his house for a sleep- over, as he did every

– Wild swimmer Colin Mckinnon on lost son Brett