Pearl remembers: "The mother was horrified that I was putting the child into a steel cot? she said she had kept the child in a wooden drawer since he was born, 'like a coffin', " she said.

Jimmy's surgery was successful. But while he was in hospital, nobody called in to see him, and when he was ready to go home, the matron had to telegram his parents. A few days passed, and they didn't reply. Eventually, she called the gardaí, and a local garda went and collected Jimmy's mother and brought her to the hospital. "When the mother came into the ward and saw Jimmy, she immediately began to cry bitterly, " recalls Pearl. "She cried hysterically and told matron that if she had to bring Jimmy home, she would commit suicide.

"She told us she had suffered seven years of agony.

When he was in the house, he was kept in a back room, locked away. Nobody knew about Jimmy except the doctor and the public health nurse.

"Fear and ignorance and guilt were very strong at that time. To have a child born into a mental handicap was one of the worst things that could happen to a family."

It was felt that "the family was being punished for some reason."

Faced with the mother's pleas, and threats of suicide, the matron relented, and sought accommodation for Jimmy at St Brigid's psychiatric hospital in Ballinasloe.

Two years later, Jimmy died, and his mother passed away some years after.

Change for the better Parry was born the year Jimmy died, in 1962, also in the west. His parents, Margaret and Austin, were told he was "severely retarded" and would only live for 10 to 13 weeks.

But he had "a change for the better" at 10 weeks, and doctors advised he would live till he was seven, remembers Margaret. Parry is now 44.

Parry is just over 4ft tall, and walks awkwardly, with a stoop. He has a mental age of between two and three. He can't talk - instead he makes a repetitive, roar-like sound.

"I would never say he was a vegetable, " says Margaret.

"He does know a certain amount - to what extent I don't know. He knows when he wants a drink, he knows when he wants food. When he is thirsty, he keeps smacking his lips.

"I was never ashamed of him, or anything like that, never ever, " says Margaret.

"I always thought that he was a lovely baby, and he was my son. And today I think the same thing. Parry brought me no sadness other than looking after him."

She remembers a man commiserating with her once, saying "it's an awful cross." "I said, 'I don't think it's a cross.

I think it's a blessing.' God sent an angel. He's an angel.

He's a pure saint, Parry."

Now Margaret is in her mid 70s, Austin in his early 80s.

Margaret's fear is what will happen to Parry after they die. She hopes she will outlive him. "I always pray to God, that God will take him before myself. The ways of God are not my ways, they're wiser."

Currently, Parry spends 14 days a month in respite care - every day of which Margaret regrets, but which is necessary to give her a break.

"I wouldn't dream of letting Parry into full-time care while there was a puff of breath in my body."

Parallel stories Award-winning producer Liam O'Brien was haunted by Jimmy's story; Pearl Finnegan had written about it in a local newspaper some years ago. Finnegan agreed to tell him Jimmy's story but without identifying the family involved, because of patient confidentiality. Finnegan then brought him to meet Parry's family, to tell a parallel, positive story of a family dealing with someone with severe disabilities.

O'Brien says working on the documentary was "an awakening, that there was this hidden Ireland out there."

Through juxtaposing the two stories, he sought to give a "rounder picture" of the difficulties of caring for profoundly disabled children, rather than focusing just on the bleak and tragic story of Jimmy.

"It's not for me or you to make a decision which mother was better in human terms, " he says.

"Margaret [Parry's mother] would not have changed anything, any aspect of her life caring for Parry. Her story will give hope to anyone who finds themselves in this situation."

'Heaven's Special Children', a documentary by Liam O'Brien, will be broadcast on RT�? Radio 1 on Wednesday 24 January at 8pm