A EUROMILLIONS winner has revealed her relationship with her family collapsed after the big win.
Gillian Bayford earned £148 million from a lucky ticket in 2012, but things quickly got out of hand with those close to her.
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The Scot was living in Haverhill, Suffolk, with her then husband Adrian Bayford when she won the life-changing sum.
And despite “£20 million” being given to relatives over the next few years, divisions emerged in the family.
Her parents stopped talking to her after she started receiving attention in the press, she told The Sun in 2016.
She said: “They are disgusted when I get that kind of attention.
‘They disowned me because I embarrass them.
“But they were more than happy to take my money.”
She says she even missed an invitation to her brother’s wedding.
Gillian also remarried Brian Deans, a conman convicted of stealing £13,000 from Tesco.
In that 2016 interview, Gillian said: “It’s disturbing and raw. The money was supposed to make everyone happy. But it has made them demanding and greedy.
“They (my family) have lost touch with where they come from.”
Gillian’s parents were broke and living in a caravan at the time of her victory.
Her father also had £700,000 in debts, shared with her brother, which they had accumulated through failed businesses.
So Gillian paid off the debt and bought her mum and dad more money so they could buy a flat in Carnoustie on the east coast of Scotland.
Nine months later her parents asked her brother for more money, £800,000, for a new playground company.
But Gillian says her brother then stopped talking to her and married secretly.
“That was the first thing we paid for.
“Adrian’s family had to wait weeks, but my parents and brother were first.
“They got their cars and houses before anyone else.”
He spent the money on a £300,000 house, Audis with private number plates and the wedding, she said.
Gillian said: “I can hold my head high because I know I got them out of a situation.
“They brought our name into disrespect in the village and we had people threatening to burn down the family home.
“My father and brother built and then closed one business after another.
“I have freed them from all guilt.”
She said her father tried to take control of the money she won and repeatedly tried to claim a stake in her company.
Gillian, who now lives in Dundee, claimed: ‘They have lost touch with where they come from.
“They rub people’s noses by showing their money, which I find downright disgusting.”
She said they got into a fight with her over a story in the newspaper that embarrassed her parents.
In an interview with the Mirror in 2016, Bayford’s mother, Brenda McCulloch, described feeling “sad” about the lack of contact with her daughter and grandchildren.
She said that although her daughter was ‘incredibly generous’, she disputed the £20 million figure, claiming it was a much lower amount they received.
Gillian also split from her husband Adrian just 15 months after winning the award.
Adrian told The Daily Mail in 2013 that the pair had split because they hadn’t spent time together as a couple – while he was busy maintaining their Georgian country home.
He said, “When you win the lottery, it’s so stressful.
“I worked so hard on those grounds [at the mansion]I haven’t had a break, we’ve never had time together as a couple.
“I mean, you can’t change what happened. It’s just something that happened. But we’re good friends, we still get along great.’
In 2021, Gillian gave birth to a lockdown baby at the age of 48 after remarriing Brian Deans in 2018.
She said: “Some things are easier because of the money, but it doesn’t really change anything. You still have to change a diaper or deal with her being sick of you, no matter how much you’re worth.
Read more about the Irish sun
Gillian now runs a property business near her home in Dundee.
In 2016, she also helped the family of a disabled boy buy and renovate a house.
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