‘IT WAS A NIGHT OF RAW EMOTION, THEN QUESTIONS…’

In this extract from her autobiography My Love Story, Tina writes with heart-wrenching honesty about trying to come to terms with the recent death of her son Craig

Hello, Dear. I just want to hear your voice and that laugh of yours.’ I smiled when my son Craig said that to me because we always joked about how he called me ‘dear’. Who calls their mother ‘dear’? Our conversation didn’t seem remarkable at the time – just the usual mother/son telephone catch-up. It was late June. Craig was in Los Angeles. I was home in Zurich. We were looking forward to his upcoming visit in August, when we planned to celebrate his 60th birthday. There were nights when we’d settle in for a really long conversation, sometimes watching an entire movie while we were on the phone (and making funny comments the whole time). But this wasn’t one of them. Craig told me that he’d met a woman who made him feel like he hadn’t felt in years. ‘Mother, I’m really happy,’ he said. I was so pleased for him because I worried that he spent too much time alone. He also said that he was on his way to a chanting meeting, which was another positive thing. Chanting opens up the mind, the heart and the spirit. In closing, he added, ‘You know you give me courage. You give me really good advice.’ Our affectionate words and casual banter seemed absolutely routine, making what happened just a few weeks later all the more shocking… July 3, 2018 promised to be a really good day. Erwin and I were celebrating our fifth wedding anniversary and I felt strong enough to travel to Paris to attend my friend Giorgio Armani’s fashion show. My recovery after my kidney transplant had been so difficult, so up and down, that I welcomed the chance to do something light-hearted. We had dinner with friends and spent the evening laughing and talking. By the time Erwin and I got back to the hotel, I was tired and ready for bed. Erwin checked our messages and played one from our accountant regarding Craig that began with: ‘Turn off the speaker.’ He did, then disappeared into the next room to listen alone. And I thought, Oh, what’s Craig gotten himself into now? I figured that he’d wrecked the car, or was in some bit of trouble like that. But when Erwin came back, he was clearly shaken. He told me that Craig was dead. Not from an accident, the one thing a nervous mother always imagines. No, my son had taken his own life – he shot himself. I heard Erwin’s words, but I didn’t really understand their meaning. I froze. This can’t be true, I prayed. I don’t remember what happened next. What I thought or felt. There were tears and cries of disbelief. A stabbing pain in my heart. A night of raw emotion. Then questions, endless questions. Why, why, why? I’ll be honest with you. I’m certainly trying to be honest with myself. Craig was a troubled soul. I can still see him as a little boy, no more than two or three, wanting so badly to sit with me when I came home from a tour, but being told by Ike to go to his room. I’m sure in his little mind he didn’t have any words to explain how much he wanted his mother, or his sense of loss when I couldn’t be with him. It wasn’t my choice. It was the way we made our living. And of course, just when he got used to having me around, it was time for me to leave, and that meant being alone again. Mother always gone. It didn’t matter if he stayed with my sister, my mother, or a trusted sitter. Craig didn’t want them: he wanted me. I think these memories stuck with Craig throughout his life. When he got older, and I was performing on my own, I tried to keep him close, even taking him on the road with me. But Craig had trouble fitting in because he wanted to be his own boss. I think that’s when he began drinking. He started attending AA meetings and he seemed to find them helpful. Unfortunately, his feelings of loneliness and insecurity always came back. When Craig visited me in France, and later in Switzerland, he’d get quiet and sad when it was time for him to go back to Los Angeles. He’d say, ‘Here comes that feeling again,’ meaning loneliness. Whenever he brought it up, I tried to be supportive. I’d tell him, ‘Okay, darling. If you feel that way, do something about it. Try to forget what happened in the past.’ I wanted him to remember how my life changed after I left Ike; how everything got better. He told me he was working on it and I believed him. I thought he was making progress, especially after he said he was happy with his new job, his

girlfriend and his home, which he had just redecorated. Why, at this point in his life, did the darkness take over? Maybe he had gone back to drinking – apparently there were empty liquor bottles in the house when he died. Maybe that’s what made him pull the trigger. I didn’t even know he had a gun. I asked my younger son, Ronnie, where it came from. The terrible irony is that it belonged to Muh [Tina’s mother]. She kept a gun, and when she died, Craig took it to his house and held on to it for all those years. I guess he thought he might want to use it one day. I was shocked by the amount of planning that went into his suicide. The thought was there. Then the preparation. Then he did it. He wrote notes – he said that he loved me, he left instructions for his funeral and he made bequests. I arranged for a small, private service in Los Angeles for family and a few close friends. I didn’t want anything public, with press and spectators. I wanted to remember Craig as he was, not focus on the way he died. The room was filled with beautiful pictures of him, with his easy smile, and gorgeous white flowers. Craig served in the navy after he graduated from high school. Because he was a veteran with an honourable discharge, he received full military honours at his funeral, including the presentation of the American flag and the playing of Taps [the traditional bugle call symbolising ‘lights out’]. I was so moved by these tributes and I kept thinking how proud he would have been to be honoured that way. We ended the memorial by going out on a boat to spread his ashes at sea, just as we did for my mother and my sister. I threw a single rose into the water as my final goodbye. I wanted just a few of Craig’s things to remind me of him. His glasses – because I always teased him about the funny way he wore them on his nose. And the pictures he took whenever he came to visit me. I’m going to make a little shrine in my chanting room so he can be with me during my quiet times. I’m still trying to keep him close. He was 59 when he died, but he’ll always be my baby. I know I’ll get through this, somehow. I’m strong. I wish I could have passed on some of my strength to Craig, or that he could have found it in himself. But what I really want is to hear my son call me ‘dear’ again.

Tina Turner: My Love Story will be published by Century, an imprint of Random House Group Ltd, on October 18, €20.

HE WAS 59 WHEN HE DIED BUT CRAIG WILL ALWAYS BE MY BABY. I WISH I COULD HAVE GIVEN HIM SOME OF MY STRENGTH