Passionate about TV shows that make her laugh and cry in equal measure. Pierra is also utterly obsessed with any series that is based on a true story.
![From Wall To Wall Productions LONG LOST FAMILY Monday 3rd July 2023 on ITV1 and ITVX Pictured: Searcher Paul Connolly (61yrs) Episode One follows two very different stories of men searching for family and the truth about their beginnings. Paul Connolly had a tough childhood. He seldom saw the people who he thought were his family, and when he started looking for answers nearly 60 years later, he was shocked by what he discovered. Paul was born in East London in 1962, the youngest in a large Irish Catholic family. ???My mother put me out with the rubbish when I was 2 weeks old.??? Paul Paul tells us that his mother had a breakdown when he was a baby and put him out with the rubbish; a neighbour heard his cries and called social services. Paul spent his childhood in care, having periodic contact with his family. When he was 8, he was sent to St. Leonard???s Children???s Home in Hornchurch. It???s now known that children in this home experienced abuse. Paul slept under his bed for self-protection. After leaving the children???s home Paul says he narrowly avoided a life of crime. He was saved by joining a boxing club, which was a bit like a family. He developed an entrepreneurial streak and now runs a successful fitness and rehabilitation business. He???s a loving father of two sons. Recently, Paul decided to research his background. As he expected, his birth certificate listed his parents as Matthew and Mary Connolly. But when his sons gave him a DNA kit, he was shocked to find out that he was only half Irish. The other half of his ancestry was Maltese. When Paul was little, there was a newsagent around the corner from his mum???s place, run by a Maltese man called Pino. Paul???s brother would say to him ???you know Pino???s your dad, right???? Paul thought this was a joke at the time, but the DNA results years later made him wonder if it was in fact true and this inspired him to turn to Long Lost Family. Our specialist researchers widened the DNA analysis, putting Paul???s DNA onto three further databases. One yielded a match to Paul???s half-brother, Frankie. We wrote to Frankie, who told us that his father was a Maltese shop owner called Philip Psaila, also known as Pino, who had died many years ago. When Frankie meets Nicky Campbell, extraordinary parallels between his life and Paul???s emerge, along with their uncanny resemblance to one another. Frankie seldom saw his father, Pino, who died in 1968, and doesn???t remember him fondly. Frankie spent time in foster care and fell in with the wrong crowd before eventually getting his life on track. He now runs an IT business and is a semi-professional singer songwriter with two grown daughters and several grandchildren. Paul is gratified to learn for certain that Pino was his father. He???s amazed to hear he has a brother whose life was so similar to his own ??? and who lives in Essex only 14 miles away from him. When they meet for the first time, they find still more ways in which their lives have followed an eerily similar course. As Paul says, it???s ???like looking into a mirror. (C) WalltoWall For further information please contact Peter Gray Mob 07831460662 / peter.gray@itv.com This photograph is (C) *** and can only be reproduced for editorial purposes directly in connection with the programme or event mentioned herein. Once made available by ITV plc Picture Desk, this photograph can be reproduced once only up until the transmission [TX] date and no reproduction fee will be charged. Any subsequent usage may incur a fee. This photograph must not be manipulated [excluding basic cropping] in a manner which alters the visual appearance of the person photographed deemed detrimental or inappropriate by ITV plc Picture Desk. This photograph must not be syndicated to any other company, publication or website, or permanently archived, without the express written permission of ITV Picture Desk. Full Terms and conditions are available on the website www.itv.com/presscentre/itvpictures/terms](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/SEI_163013397-68d7.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=646&h=363&crop=1)
