BURY mum Sherry Nisbet is facing a tug-of-love custody battle on the other side of the world.

Next month a court in New Zealand will decide the future of Sherry's children, Tamasin (9) and seven-year-old Kane (pictured).

She married Scott, a New Zealander, after a whirlwind romance 10 years ago. They emigrated but Sherry returned home with the children after the marriage hit the rocks.

Now she wants to keep them with her at her home in Chesham Road, Bury.

"I am so scared they will take my children from me - they are my life. We have always been together. It would destroy us to be apart. I have very little money but I will do whatever it takes to keep them," she said. "I can't go back. Our life is here where we are finally happy."

The couple met when Sherry was 18 and Scott, on holiday from New Zealand, was 19. When she discovered she was pregnant they decided to marry.

"I realise we were very young but we were in love and so happy. It was like a fairytale," she said yesterday. The couple married in Bury before leaving for New Zealand in 1990.

"My family warned me that I was too young and advised me to think about what I was doing. But I didn't care," recalled Sherry.

"But New Zealand was a complete culture shock. I was miles from anywhere, six months pregnant and I didn't know anyone."

Their already stormy relationship began to fall apart and Sherry and Scott separated after Kane was born. Later they got back together again but it did not last. Sherry went to a women's refuge for shelter.

After the court gave Sherry permission to return to England for a family holiday she made the decision to move back permanently.

Fifteen months ago she got her estranged husband to agree that she and the children could come back as long as she returned to New Zealand after a year.

But Sherry now says home for her and the children is in Bury - and she is prepared to fly 12,000 miles to take on the courts to prove it.

A charity gig has been organised on April 1 at Whitefield Snooker Club to help raise money for the family's fare to New Zealand.

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