A Fermanagh local who has dedicated her life to voluntarily advocating for the rights of carers has been recognised with a Spirit of Northern Ireland Award.

Caroline Kelly from Enniskillen was announced the winner of the Caring Spirit Award at the Sunday Life Spirit of Northern Ireland Awards which took place at the Titanic Belfast on Wednesday, June 5.

The special awards ceremony honours Northern Ireland’s unsung heroes who work tirelessly to transform communities or help people.

Describing Caroline as an “astonishing woman,” Helen Hamill was one of the many people who nominated her for the award.

Helen said: “Caroline, for as long as I’ve known her, has given her time advocating and empowering, ‘clueing’ up people who have disabled family members and basically have very little support and very little awareness of what support is out there. She has been freely giving her time as an advocate for them.”

As a mother of an adult son with special needs, Caroline has great empathy for the challenges and rewards of the carer’s role. She founded the Southwest Carers Forum in 2009 to help inform and support families and their carers.

“She just never tires, she’s 71 and she’s an astonishing woman, she really is,” added Helen.

Noting Caroline’s humble nature, Helen continued: “She was just the most genuinely deserving person but she is very understated in what she does, she makes very little of it but there’s an awful lot to what she does.”

Speaking to The Impartial Reporter about the awards ceremony and being announced as the winner of the Caring Spirit Award, Caroline commented: “I’m still reeling from the shock of it all.”

She continued: “It was very humbling to be at an event like that. There were 10 different categories and 10 different groups of people and it’s absolutely incredible what people do quietly in the background with no acknowledgement at all.

“Some of the people who got awards, it was just incredible to hear.

“It’s very uplifting. While I was embarrassed at the beginning of that, I was very glad at the end of the day to participate in the whole thing. It restores your faith in people and in Northern Ireland very much.”

“For me it’s just been 20 years of doing what I simply did for my own son and helping others as they came along,” concluded Caroline.