Despite having spent the majority of her life residing in the heart of Dublin city, Kayleigh Cullinan resolutely defines herself as a country girl. The 21-year-old country singer lived in Mayo until the age of nine and evidently its influence never left her.

“I actually really want a farm, which is so ironic and so strange. I want cattle, I want sheep, I want pigs. I am serious, my dad has horses. I am the country girl, ask my sisters and they will tell you that they want an apartment in town and a Golf, but that’s not me. Get me a tractor, a few cows and I’ll be sorted.”

Kathy, Kayleigh’s mother and manager laughs that her daughter is always looking at houses down the country on Daft.ie. Ever the “True Blue”, Kathy insists she is staying put in the capital and not moving into a granny flat on Kayleigh’s planned farm.

Operation Transformation

Kayleigh recently began gracing our televisions on Tuesday and Thursday evenings as one of five leaders on RTÉ One’s Celebrity Operation Transformation. She is no stranger to the screen though, having previously made it to the quarter-finals of The Voice of Ireland in 2015.

Speaking sensibly and well beyond her years, Kayleigh explains that she sees Operation Transformation as a stepping stone. She knows that she won’t lose all the weight she needs to on the show and says she aims to do it steadily and at a sustainable pace.

Prior to the show, Kayleigh’s diet was poor and lacking nutrition, with late night eating and takeaways being her biggest downfalls. However, she is as determined as ever and ready to rise to the challenge.

“I would love to be that person out at 7 o’clock in the morning going for a run. I am the girl in the car going: ‘She’s mad out running in the rain.’ But secretly wanting to do it.”

Attack

Kayleigh is bright and bubbly, the mood is light and I feel bad changing the topic to something more serious – the attack. On the way home from school at the age of 14, Kayleigh suffered a horrific assault at the hands of another teenage girl.

Her ponytail was pulled with such force that the retina at the back of her eye detached. After 12 surgeries, the recovery from which included lying face down for 23 hours a day, Kayleigh has no sight in her right eye. Seven years on, she shows her perseverance and strength through her positive outlook on life.

“I have a really positive mindset and I don’t allow negativity into my life whatsoever, whether that be people, energy, anything at all. Now looking back on the attack, that is all I am doing, looking back. The way I see it, it has happened in my life and I have moved on. I don’t like to dwell on it.

Obviously it was horrific, I still don’t have sight in my right eye, but that’s not going to change.”

Now an ambassador for Cycle Against Suicide, Kayleigh says her advice to anyone being bullied or going through a tough time is to talk: “The best thing you can do is talk and I put all of my negative energy into something positive. I put it all into my music but it could be football, whatever the hell you want. I’m 100% passionate about putting whatever negative energy you have into something positive – you will be getting better at it and you won’t even realise it.”

Music

With a drummer as a father and a mother steeped in the music industry, Kayleigh grew up on “showbands, country music, trad music and ceilí music”. Her musical inspiration comes from the likes of John McNicholl, Jimmy Buckley, Mike Denver, Joe Dolan and the Miami Showband.

From a young age, Kayleigh aspired to be singer but insists she wasn’t blessed with talent, chuckling that unfortunately there is video evidence of this that she hopes never surfaces. It was only during her recovery from the attack that she discovered her stellar vocal cords.

“When I was able to get up, I said to my mam: ‘Look, can I sing you a song?’ I remember her response was something along the lines of, ‘you can climb the Himalayas if you want to’, once I did anything at all. I sang the song for her and got extremely emotional all of a sudden, my mam got emotional too and cried... The rest is history, it has just gone on from there.”

City or country, it doesn’t matter, this girl is tough whatever way you look at it. From a terrible situation, this songbird has risen from the ashes. CL