A violent marriage and two dead children: the tragic life of Tina Turner

The Queen of Rock passed away this Wednesday at the age of 83 at her home in Zurich, Switzerland, after fighting a long illness. Tina Turner She suffered from intestinal cancer and kidney failure, for which she had been transplanted from a kidney, donated by her current husband, four years ago. The artist, born in Tennessee, was pure energy on stage, where she forgot the shadows that lurked in her life to be happy with her greatest passion: music.

She started in the industry with her first husband, Ike Turnerdiscoverer and musical partner whom she married in 1962: “The wedding was disturbing,” she confessed in her memoirs. “He took me to a brothel on the wedding night. It was very traumatic for me to watch a live sex show during a night that was supposed to be intimate and special. I was sad the whole time, about to cry, but there was no escape. We couldn’t leave until Ike was ready, and he was having a great time,” he confessed.

That was the starting point of a hell that developed between violence and mistreatment. Ike, addicted to drugs, beat Tina tremendously that ended in broken jaws, dislocated joints, black eyes, facial injuries after throwing boiling coffee at her and even before going out to sing, on more than one occasion, he had to swallow his own blood, as she herself revealed. Her ordeal lasted 16 years: in 1978, after a beating that almost killed her, she abandoned him.

The death of his two children

tina had four children: of biological (Craig, the result of his relationship with Raymond Hill, and Ronald, with Ike Turner) and two adopted (Ike and Michael, children of Ike and his previous marriage). The eldest of all committed suicide at the age of 59 in his Studio City home, in Los Angeles, in 2018. According to local police, the singer’s son was found dead from a shot. Later, the singer spoke about the tragic event to BBC News: “I still don’t know what it was that led him to the abyss,” she revealed. “I think Craig was lonely, but I don’t know why he didn’t call me or his girlfriend. I have pictures of him smiling and I feel like he’s in a better place now.”

As soon as he had responded to this severe blow, life had prepared another new tragedy: Ronald’s death, in 2022. The actor and director suffered from cancer: “Ronnie, you left the world too soon. In sadness I close my eyes and think of you, my beloved son.”she said goodbye.

a hard childhood

Tina’s life was very difficult from the beginning. Born in Tennessee as Ana Mae Bullock, was abandoned by her mother at age 11: “She never loved me. She was young and didn’t want to have children.” Her father abused his wife and also his daughters, Tina and Ruby, whom he cared for until he remarried and left them to fend for themselves. Her grandmother took care of them both in Brownsville and they began working very young as maids. Upon her death, the girls reconnected with her mother and began a new life in St Louise, where Tina began singing in clubs until she was discovered by Ike Turner.