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'It's exhausting because everything you do... he's always there': The first Christmas without a brother

Nicole Ryan campaigns to raise awareness about the dangers of drugs after her brother Alex died in January.

Alex1 Alex and Nicole when they were children. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

ON THE NIGHT of Monday 19 January Alex Ryan was on a night out with a group of friends in Cork city.

The 18-year-old was a popular, laid back teenager from the town of Millstreet. Like many young people his age, he enjoyed going out with his friends and wasn’t too worried about the future.

He had recently completed his Leaving Certificate in Millstreet Community College, and had been spending more time in the city, meeting new people and enjoying his freedom.

A picture of Alex from the previous July shows him decked out in an afro wig, hand raised in the air soaking up the atmosphere at Townlands, his first music festival.

Alex2 Alex at Townlands Festival. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

Alex loved music. Standing at a towering 6ft 5 in, he’s described as a “gentle giant” by those who knew him.

After finishing up in the city on that night, Alex and a few others headed back to a house party on Green Street in the Greenmount area of Cork.

Once back, they decided to take what they believed was the drug 2C-B, a hallucinogenic and stimulant, popular among young drug users. Some of the group swallowed what they thought was a single trip of the drug. Alex snorted it.

Soon after, as one of the party goers would later describe, all hell broke loose.

The drug took hold and people began to suffer extreme hallucinations, far more powerful than those associated with a dose of 2C-B.

Local man Gerard Banks was passing by the house when he heard loud shouting from within. He decided to investigate.

Banks was let into the building by a dishevelled looking man who didn’t seem to know what was going on, and as Banks later told Neil Prendeville on Cork’s RedFM, what he found inside “was like a scene from CSI”.

As he described it, there was a man and a woman “dancing naked on the chairs” covered in blood while another smashed up the house. Alex had suffered a seizure and was on the floor in a state of cardiac arrest.

The gardaí and paramedics had been called and Alex was rushed to Cork University Hospital. His organs were failing and doctors put him into an induced coma.

However, he was taken out of the coma less than 24 hours later.

“All his organs were failing when he first got in there, but they all repaired,” his sister Nicole Ryan told TheJournal.ie.

“He was alright. We were hoping he’d be okay, but he kind of started to deteriorate and his brain started swelling.

“He had an episode then on the Thursday night where he was almost in cardiac arrest again.

And then on the Friday he was pronounced brain dead.

Alex Ryan was taken off life support and declared dead on Saturday 23 January. His organs were donated to four people in need.

The State Pathologist Dr Margaret Bolster would later rule he had died of a cardiac after taking the drug.

Alex3 Alex in CUH in January before he died. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

Campaign 

The drug Alex and the others had taken wasn’t 2C-B, but a far more potent and dangerous psychoactive drug 25I-NBOMe – known in some cases as N-Bomb.

N-Bomb is a derivative of the 2C family of drugs and requires a far, far smaller dose to produce hallucinogenic effects. For this reason, it is usually sold in blotter form (like the more well-known LSD).

download (21) File photo of 25I-NBOMe seized in the United States. It is commonly sold on blotters like this. Shelby County Drug Enforcement Task Force Shelby County Drug Enforcement Task Force

It is known as a ‘designer drug’ – a broad term used to categorise synthetic, laboratory-made substances increasingly used by drug takers.

Drugs of this kind (other examples include mephedrone, and the cannabis substitute Clockwork Orange) are available for purchase on the internet, and came to prominence during the Head Shop boom in Ireland in the late-2000s.

Head Shops sprung up around the country towards the end of the last decade, selling various amphetamine, cannabis and other substitutes under a variety of different names.

In some areas, shops would open until 4am or later, selling substances out of hatches. They were closed down under sweeping legislation in 2010.

11/5/2010 Head Shops To Close The Happy Days Head Shop on South Georges St pictured before it closed down in 2010 Sasko Lazarov / Photocall Ireland Sasko Lazarov / Photocall Ireland / Photocall Ireland

The drugs however, didn’t go away.

Latest drug monitoring reports show that the use and proliferation of these types of synthetic substances is increasing all the time.

Harry Clifton – who was jailed in November for supplying drugs to Alex and his friends – thought he was selling them 2C-B.

Clifton, of St Finbarr’s Place, Proby’s Quay in Cork, got six months in prison for supplying the drug which led to Alex’s death.

A young man and young woman received two-year suspended sentences for conspiring with another to possess a controlled drug.

Nicole Ryan spoke out against the sentences at the time, calling them a “mockery”.

“Alex has paid his price for the choices he made, but the sentences they were given is a mockery, really,” she said.

Alex7 Alex Ryan died from a cardiac arrest after he took the drug N-Bomb Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

Speaking to TheJournal.ie this month – a number of weeks after the sentencing – Ryan strikes a more conciliatory tone.

“We kind of knew the verdict that people were going to get. But I was actually surprised that Harry got any time in prison,” said Nicole.

Nicole says she understands that the people in the party were supposed to be Alex’s friends, but she could not forgive them after what happened.

“At the end of the day they also lost somebody.

I’m not going to have to like them – and I don’t – but they have to live with the guilt of what happened that night, and having to live with that as punishment.

Remembering

Alex grew up in Millstreet with Nicole and their mother Irene. Nicole was four years older than him, and she says they were close growing up.

Every Christmas Day, Nicole says she and Alex had a tradition.

They would watch a Harry Potter movie, each year watching the next installment in the series.

“So this year we would have reached Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Part 1, but it’s not going to happen this time,” says Nicole.

He’s not here anymore and I can’t continue that without him.

Nicole says that she has found the months since Alex’s death very hard, and things are not getting easier.

She suffers from depression, and has been taking medication to try to control her moods.

screenshot_20161219-182522_1 Nicole and Alex when they were kids at Christmas. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

When she is not taking medication, Nicole describes her grief as though there is a constant presence of Alex with her wherever she goes.

“It’s very hard to describe unless you’ve lost somebody. But for me it’s like he’s part of me,” she says.

And it gets very exhausting because everything you do, no matter what you’re doing, he’s always there. Like he’s part of you. It’s like you’re two people in one.

Nicole says she can get on better with her day-to-day life when she takes medication, but that then the overwhelming feeling is one of numbness.

“But what it’s like taking the medication is like I would have no feelings towards anything,” she says.

If something bad was to happen I’d acknowledge that it’s really bad but I wouldn’t be upset, I wouldn’t be sad, I’d just be indifferent.

The first of November was Alex’s birthday, and Nicole and her mother travelled to Ballyheigue beach in Kerry where his ashes had been spread after he was cremated.

She said they had been fearing the occasion in the months up to it, but it had turned out to be a lovely day for both of them.

“We were dreading that day for a long, long time because as you know he was turning 19 but he wasn’t there to see it,” she says.

But it was actually a phenomenal day – the weather and everything – nothing was really sad about it.

Alex6 Nicole celebrating Alex's birthday in November. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

The first Christmas without Alex will be tough, Nicole says.

Usually on the day the three of them would just sit around, eat too much food, lie on the couch and watch tv.

This year, Nicole says she and her mother spend the holidays away from the house.

“Just the thought of staying at home would be very hard and very painful for us,” she says.

Instead, the pair will spend some time in Kerry, and visit Ballyheigue beach again on Christmas Day to be close to Alex.

Alex’s Adventure of a Lifetime 

In the wake of Alex’s death, Nicole brought herself into the media spotlight, using her personal tragedy as a basis for warning people against the dangers of drugs.

She has been vocal in trying to advocate for an alternative drug policy and to warn people about the dangers of synthetic drugs.

In March, she began the Alex’s Adventure of a Lifetime campaign, using her brother’s story to highlight the dangers around unregulated, untested drugs and advocating for better education to be given to students in order to empower them to make better decisions.

She said the campaign grew out of a need to do something after Alex’s death, and was a way of keeping his spirit alive. Nicole has travelled to a number of schools in the south of Ireland to speak with students.

14716048_1045292822254278_631700945863829790_n Students from Ard Scoil Rís in Limerick with Nicole. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

Young people will take drugs, Nicole says, so she believes there should be extensive education given to them to warn them against the dangers.

“People think I’m completely against drugs – I mean I’m not for drugs – but I’m for a sensible drug policy,” she says.

“That’s the reason why young people die because we don’t have a sensible drug policy in place. These are unregulated, you can buy this stuff online and get it delivered to your door.

You have to realise that people do take drugs. And a lot of people in college are going to take drugs whether you say it’s bad or not. But we need to give them an outlet, of number one – doing them safer.
Or number two – educating them on all these different drugs and all the different effects that they have and so that you can make an informed decision about what you’re going to take when you’re going to take it.

Nicole says deaths could be avoided by ensuring that they know of the dangers that are out there.

Alex could be anybody’s child. It could happen to anyone so easy. I never thought it would happen to me, but it did and it can happen to absolutely anybody.

The future 

The government has recently finished its public consultation for forming a new Drugs Strategy on how to shape the State’s approach to tackling drug use.

A commitment in the Programme for Government involves the approach moving away from a criminal focus and towards a health-based system.

Nicole says she has plans next year to move her campaign towards advocating and agitating in politics to inform a more sensible drugs policy.

Alex4 Nicole Ryan says what happened to Alex could happen to anybody. Nicole Ryan Nicole Ryan

She would like to dedicate all of her to the campaign, but she has bills to pay, a job to keep down, and her own grief to get through.

“It’s a weird thing because it helps as a cure. The more I talk about him to more it helps me to help somebody else,” says Nicole.

“If one person can read Alex’s story because I said it, and they changed their mind that night about taking whatever they were going to take – then that’s one person that is now maybe alive because of that.

“It helps me but it also is hard to move on as well.

But at the end of the day, what am I moving onto? I have nothing anymore. He’s gone, you know? Nothing in life makes me happy and I don’t think it will for a while.

“It’s a realisation that I will have to come to accept at some point but for now I just can’t.”

You can read more about Nicole and the Alex’s Adventure of a Lifetime campaign by visiting her blog here

Read: “When he died, a lot of my dreams and my hopes died with him”

Read: “Those who sell drugs don’t give a damn about human life”

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12 Comments
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    Mute Numinous20111
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    Jan 29th 2025, 7:31 AM

    I don’t mean this in bad taste, but honestly those astronauts are in a better place at the moment. Hope they get back safely.

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    Mute Setanta O'Toole
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    Jan 29th 2025, 7:35 AM

    @Numinous20111: they will probably have to swear a loyalty oath under extreme duress in MAGA space helmets before he lets them down.

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    Mute Numinous20111
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    Jan 29th 2025, 7:39 AM

    @Setanta O’Toole: I’d expect Trump & Musk to milk the publicity of a safe return. It takes genuine courage to get launched in a rocket and stay on an orbiting station. Now that courage is tested even further by the unreliability of a retrieval flight. And both will probably need physical therapy to cope with normal gravity again.

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    Mute Mick O'K
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    Jan 29th 2025, 8:08 AM

    @Numinous20111: can you not for just a second put the TDS to one side and spare a thought for two people stranded in space. You’re as bad as the multi account trolls on this site

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    Mute Joe Beirne
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    Jan 29th 2025, 8:25 AM

    @Harry Paisley: alright Ian,

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    Mute Eric Gaffney
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    Jan 29th 2025, 8:46 AM

    @Numinous20111: No they’re not.

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    Mute Brian
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:15 AM

    @Mick O’K: Anyone using the made up acronym TDS is a troll or a child.. most probably both.

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    Mute John O Reilly
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:25 AM

    @Harry Paisley: hopefully all your relatives abroad will be sent home too

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    Mute Setanta O'Toole
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:41 AM

    @Numinous20111: I hope that British Diver who was involved in the rescue in Thailand doesn’t use this rescue as an opportunity to return a similar baseless insult to Elon. That wouldn’t be hilarious at all.

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    Mute Mick O'K
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    Jan 29th 2025, 10:48 AM

    @Brian: thanks for you input as ever pal

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    Mute Dermot Blaine
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    Jan 29th 2025, 12:15 PM

    @Mick O’K: the two do not consider themselselves stranded, they’re happy enough being up there, in fact.

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    Mute Mick O'K
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    Jan 29th 2025, 12:53 PM

    @Dermot Blaine: “Veteran astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams arrived at the ISS in June aboard Boeing’s Starliner, and were due to spend only eight days on the orbiting laboratory, but technical problems on the spacecraft prompted NASA to change plans.” Happy or not they’re stranded

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    Mute Dermot Blaine
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    Jan 29th 2025, 2:59 PM

    @Mick O’K: what I said is they don’t consider themselves to be stranded.

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    Mute Jack Dermody
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    Jan 29th 2025, 3:18 PM

    @Mick O’K: Le’s be clear… This is a publicity stunt which Trump is giving a horse load of money for Musk to perform.

    They are far from stranded… they are in the ISS with 8 others… Yes they have been up there for a bit…

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    Mute Ulick
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    Jan 29th 2025, 4:50 PM

    @Numinous20111: Really, you should go.

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    Mute Ulick
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    Jan 29th 2025, 4:51 PM

    @Setanta O’Toole: TDS.

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    Mute Setanta O'Toole
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:42 PM

    @Ulick: and proud. Say hello to all the rest of the McGee clan for me.

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    Mute Bob Cobban
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    Jan 29th 2025, 7:37 AM

    Hope they get back safely and have all their correct paperwork with them. Otherwise, they might get deported back.

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    Mute Stanley Marsh
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    Jan 29th 2025, 10:05 AM

    @Bob Cobban: Wasn’t it always the plan to bring them back around March which from an end of January perspective sounds very similar to “as soon as possible”.

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    Mute John Darker
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:38 AM

    Lol,
    You just have to laugh at the last paragraph the way the wording is framed like the Russian craft was somehow inferior…
    But what actually happened was ….Rubio, Prokopyev and Petelin arrived on the ISS aboard a Soyuz capsule on Sept. 21, 2022. They were due to return to Earth on March 28 but had to remain in space after their spacecraft was hit by a piece of space junk or meteoroid in December 2022, which caused an uncontrollable radiator leak. The unrepairable capsule was returned to Earth and was replaced by another uncrewed capsule in February, which the trio used to return home.

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    Mute Tezmond McVicar
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:43 AM

    @John Darker: correct!

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    Mute Iano C
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    Jan 29th 2025, 8:03 AM

    How is Musk having a dig at Biden? Isn’t it Musk who’s the one that can get them?

    25
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    Mute Damien Leahy
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    Jan 29th 2025, 9:57 AM

    @Iano C: spacex is private, nasa is not. Fairly simple.

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    Mute David Jordan
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    Jan 29th 2025, 11:27 AM

    @Damien Leahy: They were supposed to be brought back by a different private company, Boeing, but Boeing’s Starliner capsule is beset by problems (valves on thrusters this time). So rather than return to Earth in the potentially unsafe Starliner capsule, it left the space station without the two astronauts leaving them stranded.

    NASA is under funded, so now relies heavily on private companies to get to and from space. NASA lacks the funds to design and build their own human rated space capsules (the Orion capsule for SLS is being built by Lockheed Martin).

    Of course, you can say, but private companies can fill the gap, but as we have seen, Boeing is making garbage and SpaceX could fold if Starship ends up (as many think) a hair brained dead end money pit.

    Where does that leave NASA if that happened? Well, giving them the funding they need and deserve will not fix things, as their best engineers and expertise are now gone. They’d have to build that back up again, that is time-consuming and expensive, and it’s why SLS is costing so much, as they lack in house expertise and outsourced a lot of the development to private companied (Lockheed Martin, Boeing) who know how to milk the system.

    These by the way are protected by career Senators who like the cash and jobs this brings to their states, where facilities are based, which also influences NASA’s design decisions e.g. it’s why SLS retained old c. 25-year-old Space Shuttle engines (RS-25) made by Rocketdyne (now Aerojet Rocketdyne) in Alabama, rather than someone other company or NASA developing its own new rocket engines. For example engine E2045 first flew in 2002 on Atlantis, and was upgraded and overhauled for SLS, costing perhaps more than to just design and make an entirely new engine.

    https://www.bcatoday.org/alabama-senators-supported-alabama-based-rocket-launch-vehicles/

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    Mute Jacintha Dumbrell
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    Jan 29th 2025, 7:45 AM

    Draining the swamp, LOLZ!

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    Mute Hugh Lynch
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    Jan 29th 2025, 11:57 AM

    Hope they have their passports ready on touchdown

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    Mute scott cooper
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    Jan 29th 2025, 2:37 PM

    Not sure I’d trust the SpaceX rockets yet. Doesn’t seem like he’s cracked it, yet

    7
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    Mute William Jennings
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    Jan 29th 2025, 1:50 PM

    I really hope SpaceX replaces NASA eventually as the main space contractor. SpaceX is able to launch rockets into space for only $1 billion. NASA’s launches now take 12 years to build and plan for and $36 billion to complete. SpaceX can get a rocket up into space for 1/36th of the cost and in half the time because Elon Musk is spending his own money to complete it. In the 55 years since NASA send the first man up to the moon, they’ve made little progress in innovation and cost cutting. They pay contractor development costs and then add 10% profit. The more things cost, the bigger the contractor profit. So contractors had little incentive to innovate. SpaceX, on the other hand, has created new technology like reusable rocket boosters that have transformed space exploration.

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    Mute Derek O Gorman
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    Jan 29th 2025, 1:38 PM

    Trump and musk will engineer the rescue together I bet.

    4
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    Mute Ulick
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    Jan 29th 2025, 4:51 PM

    Ireland needs a politician with stones like Trump.

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    Mute Brian D'Arcy
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    Jan 29th 2025, 8:33 PM

    @Ulick: Move to the USA so, no one is forcing you to stay here.

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    Mute Setanta O'Toole
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    Jan 30th 2025, 8:38 AM

    @Ulick: miniscule and going down past their knees?

    1
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