Dil Wickremasinghe
Born1973
Rome,[1] Italy
OccupationBroadcaster
PartnerAnne Marie Toole
Websitehttp://www.dilw.ie/

Dil Wickremasinghe is a broadcaster and journalist living in Ireland. She was a radio presenter with Newstalk and is a panellist on TV3's Midday programme.[1] She has also done stand-up comedy.[2]

Biography

Born in Rome to Sri Lankan parents, who rejected her at the age of 17 after she told them she was gay and she became homeless as a result.[1][3] Her mother, a Jehovah's Witness, attempted to "cure" her of her lesbianism after she fell in love with a girl.[1] She is also a survivor of sexual abuse.[4] While in Sri Lanka, she had a job on the radio but was dismissed in a dispute over her sexual orientation.[1][5] As well as Italy and Sri Lanka, she lived for a time in Bahrain where she dated an Irish woman. She moved to Ireland in 2000; within 24 hours she was dancing down O'Connell Street, singing along to "It's Raining Men" at the Dublin Pride festival, an event which she regarded as crucial to her decision to settle in Ireland.[1]

She later experienced depression and received counselling from One in Four (the charity founded by Colm O'Gorman).[1] She first met her partner, the psychotherapist Anne Marie Toole, when they were forced to share a room at a weekend mental health conference in Wicklow on 30 April 2010, the day of Gerry Ryan's death.[1] They started dating one month later.[1]

In 2014, she announced she was pregnant. In doing so, she became the first lesbian in Irish public life to start a family with her partner.[4] Despite past difficulties with her parents, she reported they were delighted at the idea of becoming grandparents for the first time.[5] During her pregnancy she became a target of David Quinn and his Catholic Iona Institute, as well as numerous other anonymous individuals who questioned her fitness for motherhood.[1][5]

On 4 February 2014, she received the Lord Mayor of Dublin's Frederick Douglass Award.[4][6]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Smith, Andrea (16 March 2015). "Newstalk presenter Dil Wickremasinghe and her partner Anne Marie Toole on the joy of their first baby". Sunday Independent.
  2. ↑ McManus, D. (11 August 2013). "Dil's playful personality makes hardline topics easy listening". Sunday Independent.
  3. ↑ "An octogenarian gentleman taught me that it's never too late to come out". TheJournal.ie. 17 February 2015.
  4. 1 2 3 Kennedy, Jason (28 November 2014). "'I'm walking on air': Gay Newstalk presenter on her pregnancy". Irish Independent.
  5. 1 2 3 "The Iona Institute's David Quinn has crossed the line of decency". 3 March 2015. Archived from the original on 16 May 2015.
  6. ↑ "Newstalk's Dil Wickremasinghe receives Frederick Douglass Award". 5 February 2014. Archived from the original on 16 May 2015.
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