Emmerdale’s Zoe Henry reveals ‘catastrophic’ Rhona Goskirk outcome that is ‘worse than 𝔻eath’

Emmerdale’s Rhona Goskirk (Zoe Henry) has recently fallen madly, head-over-heels in love – with Ivy, the baby who is genetically her daughter but that she has no legal claim over.

The bond Rhona instinctively felt for the baby who came from an embryo that she and her then-husband had frozen many years ago became deeper over Christmas. Gus (Alan McKenna), the baby’s father, was unable to care for Ivy and left her in Rhona and Marlon (Mark Charnock)’s care as he grieved for his late wife.

Marlon and Mary (Louise Jameson) also love Ivy, but for Rhona it’s what Zoe Henry calls a ‘primal instinct’ that bonds her to the child and when Gus returns and says he’s ready to have Ivy back, Rhona is not ready.

‘She can probably see that he is quite capable of having her at home on his own, but she’s grown so attached to Ivy, understandably, and the thought of being without her, even for a night, is overwhelming,’ Zoe told us.

A desperate Rhona disappears from the village

Even worse for Rhona, Gus announces that he plans to take Ivy to live in France with her grandparents.

‘He dangles the carrot of “You can come and see her whenever you want,” but the reality of that is they live in Yorkshire,’ Zoe pointed out.

‘How often are they going to get to France? It’s not going to be every other weekend or one visit in a week. It’s going to be holidays. And that is a dagger to Rhona’s heart. She wants Ivy in her life as much as she can.’

Before Gus takes Ivy away he gives Rhona the chance to spend one more day with her.

‘She goes and sits in the garden in the village, near the allotments and just sobs, because this is goodbye, she feels like. It’s pretty brutal,’ Zoe said, and described how a conversation with Charity (Emma Atkins) fires Rhona up to take desperate action.

‘Charity’s got her own stuff going on, which the audience will know about, and I think Charity’s a bit like, “I’m sick of men doing what they want, getting their own way all the time. What about you? What about your rights?” And it fires something up in Rhona. This is the first time that somebody has really come at it from Rhona’s point of view. Marlon supports her and loves Ivy but he’s not really rallying for her like Charity does. I think she just sees the opportunity and seizes the moment. It’s a moment of madness.’

Rhona decides to leave the village, taking Ivy with her.

‘It’s not a planned kidnap, she would never do that,’ Zoe insisted. ‘This has come from somewhere deeper inside her. She’s an intelligent woman, she knows the consequences of kidnap. So it comes from nowhere but it comes from the heart as well. it’s that primal instinct of “I can’t be separated from her.”’

When asked how Rhona would cope if she was to lose Ivy, Zoe said it would be ‘catastrophic’ for her character.

‘I think she’d have a nervous breakdown. It would be a grief, like a loss, like Ivy had died. They talk about how, when relationships break up and somebody leaves a partner, it’s almost worse than death because that person has gone, but they’re still here, they’re still alive. At least when somebody dies you know that’s the end.

‘I think that would be torture for Rhona, knowing that Ivy’s not with her and is never going to be with her but is alive and living a life somewhere else. It’s the impossible thought of that, really.’