When your child is looking up at you and you are putting them to bed at night, and they are just lying there, you have to remind yourself that's what it's all about.

Why me? Why did this happen? How could I be in Westlife and then have nothing to show for it financially at the end of it? But it's like, why not me? That's just life. It's tough. There's a lot more problems in the world. There are a lot of people who would wish to God they had my problem instead of having a sick child.

It's amazing how lucky Westlife were and what we achieved. It's very rare to have seven number ones in a row. Ridiculous in fact.

You've got to go down the road you naturally go down, and for me it was pop, folk country, just feel-good music. I suppose most of my songs are very up-tempo.

After Westlife, I was in a scared place, you know; you've three children, and I worry about providing for them, and I had no guarantees going forward about the future.

I didn't want to be a solo Westlife - covers and ballads - and the reason I signed with Capitol Records was because they wanted me to write songs myself. It was pretty scary, but they put me in a studio in Nashville with some new songwriters, and the results were pretty good.

Together with a team of financial and legal experts I have spent months exploring all possible alternatives to bankruptcy but to no avail.