Terri Irwin should have been on top of the world. Arriving back home in Australia after Bindi's Emmy success in New York, it seemed her life was back on track. Although she smiled for the cameras while on a visit to Tasmania, only her close friends knew the pain she felt.

Terri's celebratory homecoming hid a tragic secret. For only days after she and her daughter Bindi were the toast of the American TV world, Terri's beloved dad, Clarence Raines, had died from 'aged-related causes'. He was 86.

While her late husband Steve was her friend, lover and soulmate, Terri says her dad was her mentor - someone she had idolised all her life. It was Clarence and Terri's mother Julia who'd helped her through the dark days after losing Steve.

Tower of strength

He was her pillar of strength and her confidante. Now, the two most important men in her life are gone, and Terri is left to muster the strength to struggle on in silence for the sake of her two young children.

Heartbroken Terri, who has just turned 44, has never left any doubt about how much she loved her dad. She knew Steve would put his life on the line for his own dad Bob and his late mother Lynn - and she felt the very same way about her parents. She would go to the end of the earth for both of them.

'He was a very special human being,' Terri had said in a glowing tribute to her father, whose memorial service was held on July 1 in her home town of Eugene in Oregon. It was only two weeks after talented Bindi won an Emmy for her TV show, Bindi, the Jungle Girl.

Her late father is survived by Terri's mother Julia, her brother and two sisters, and seven grandchildren.

'Losing her dad is a shocking blow for Terri,' a family friend tells New Idea. 'But at least she was in America and had spent some quality time with him.

'I know Terri is still living through the heartbreak of losing Steve, and now this has happened,' the friend adds. 'It's just really, really sad for Terri - our heart goes out to her and the rest of their family.

'All of us who have worked with Terri feel deeply saddened by his death because we know how close she and her father were,' the friend continues. 'They might have lived on opposite sides of the world, but they always kept in close contact with each other. And it's very sad for Terri that this marks the end of an era.'

His pride and joy

Whenever Terri visited the US, she always made sure she and the children visited her family. Another friend describes how he saw first-hand the love between father and daughter on Terri's wedding day in the USA in 1992.

'I'll never forget the look on Clarence's face that day,' the friend recalls. 'You could just see how proud he was of Terri. Apart from Steve, I think he was the happiest man at the wedding.

'Like a lot of fathers, he shared a special bond with his daughter, especially as Terri was the youngest,' the source adds.

Terri credits her father for her love of animals. As a child, her dad - who served in the navy before serving as a lieutenant in the Eugene Police Department, and then running a large trucking company - was forever bringing home sick and injured animals.

'He instilled in me an everlasting respect and love for these creatures,' says Terri, who nursed everything from sick raccoons to injured bears. In later life, while working for her dad in the trucking company, Terri opened a rehabilitation centre called Cougar County for injured and stray animals. And in 1991, while on a fact-finding mission to Australia, she met and fell in love with Steve.

Back to life

The next few months will be the most trying time for Terri, removed from her close-knit family in America. Little Bindi, who turns 10 this week, and Bob, four, are also mourning the loss of their grandfather.

Not only is Terri organising a variety of functions at Australia Zoo, but one of the biggest celebrations was to be Father's Day on September 7. It holds significance for Terri and the children as it comes only a few days after the second anniversary of Steve's death - he died after a stingray barb pierced his heart while he was filming on the Great Barrier Reef.

The friend says: 'Terri is such a brave person and has been to hell and back since Steve died. It just seems so unfair she has to relive all that pain again.'

By Warren Gibbs