Brought up in a Dublin orphanage Eileen Mackin has finally met her mother after a 60-year search

An 81-year-old Irish woman finally met her 103-year-old mother after searching for her for over 60 years.

Eileen Mackin was brought up in a Dublin orphanage in the 1930s and 40s and her call to Liveline, an Irish radio, seeking her mother caused a huge reaction.

After her plea, a genealogist offered to help out and try and locate the mother she had never met.  Through some incredible detective work, they found  Elizabeth, her mother, in Scotland. Elizabeth celebrates her 104th birthday tomorrow, Saturday, May 11.

The 104-year-old received the birthday gift of a lifetime when her daughter came calling to the house where she lives, with one of her sons.

Mackin told the Irish Times “I just went over with my daughter and my husband and her husband and I knocked on the door and a gentleman opened it, and I told him I was from Ireland and that I had found my mum and could I come to see her, and he said ‘certainly’.”

Elizabeth was waiting for her “She said: ‘I was born in Ireland,’ and she was thrilled, and she never let go of my hands and she put her arms around me.”

Eileen Macken, who was born in the Bethany Home in Dublin, has been reunited with her mother after 60 years of searching for her pic.twitter.com/Gc3X7WRr02

— RTÉ News (@rtenews) May 9, 2019

"Elizabeth just looked up at me and took my hand and we had a great chat. There was such a bond between the two of us, it was fantastic.”

“I said to my children all my life that I loved this lady, but I didn’t know who she was. And that is exactly what I got when I went to the door,” she said.

“If you saw her little face, such a happy little lady, she is just fantastic. I can’t believe this surprise I got at this stage in my life, you can’t understand how thrilled I am.”

Mackin said it was tough to say goodbye.

“She wouldn’t let me go but I was afraid to stay too long with her because she is elderly, and I have to respect that. But her son was so lovely, and my mum said to me: ‘Oh I wish I could get up and make some tea for you but I don’t think I’ll be able'.”

Mackin and her family spent three days with her in Scotland.

“I am going around singing, I’m that happy,” she said. “You have no idea what it has done to me. I’m just so happy and I’m so grateful.”

Read more: Heroic Irish boy saved teenage girl from attempted abduction