FORMER Celtic and Scotland star Kris Commons has told how he fears he will “never heal” from the stillbirth of his daughter Lola.

Footballer Kris, 35, also revealed he didn’t see his daughter after she was still-born for fear of thinking he could bring her back to life.

Recalling the traumatic events of ten years ago, Kris said: “The amount of pain I felt on that first day has never healed.

“I wanted my first experience of holding my first child to be magical. But when we got the news that Lola had passed away it was always going to be a nightmare. I put myself into a closet and wanted to move into happier times with Lisa.

“It sits with me fine that I didn’t see her, but it doesn’t sit well with Lisa. I didn’t want to be holding my first child and for it to be a dead baby. There was a fear that maybe I would think I could bring her back.”

Kris, who also played for Nottingham Forest, Stoke City and Hibs, is taking part in a moving new documentary, Labour of Love, about parents who have experienced still-birth, to be screened on BBC Alba next week.

Kris and wife Lisa Hague now have three children, but Lisa spoke of how the trauma of enduring still-birth can rock marriages.

She said: “Me and Kris worked together when she died but we also grieved very separately and ten years on I see now why it causes families to break up.

“It does seem to be that the mum feels the dad has moved on. I wanted to talk about her to anybody who would listen and Kris didn’t, he just wanted to go back to playing football, and that’s what he did. I think he needed that feeling of normality.

“Kris only had two days off work, between the day she died, the post mortem and the funeral. He played a game of football the day before her funeral. I didn’t mind him doing that, I felt that sorry for him that his daughter had just died. I would get up and walk for hours, and that was my therapy.”

The programme, made by Glasgow-based GH Productions, sees BBC presenter Mairi Rodgers embark on a personal journey, driven by her experience of losing a baby in 2016 at five months.

Lisa, has become an advocate for Scots still-birth charity SiMBA, for which she established the Lola Commons Fund to promote the creation of family rooms for grieving parents.

In the programme, she reads an emotional letter she wrote to her daughter Lola, and expresses her regret over not taking the chance to hold her.

One line reads: “Lola, I could write a book for how I’m feeling. Please remember how much your daddy and I love you and miss you, you’re our first baby and we feel lost without you."

Labour of Love is on BBC Alba next Tuesday at 9pm.