Tina Turner still can’t fathom why her son, Craig Turner, committed suicide at age 59.
Just months after Craig was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound at his Studio City, Calif. home on July 3, his famous mom opened up to BBC News about what possibly contributed to his suicide.
Turner said Craig had a new job and a new girlfriend.
“I still don’t know what took him to the edge because at that stage he had said to me that he had never met a woman that he felt that way about,” the What’s Love Got to Do With It performer shared Friday.
“He was bringing her to meet me [for] his birthday in August. He had decorated his apartment that I bought him years ago. He had gotten a new job with a prominent real estate company in California, [which] he was very happy with.”
Read More: Tina Turner Says Goodbye to Late Son: ‘He Will Always Be My Baby’
Still, Turner can’t help but wonder if Craig’s “loneliness” played a role in his death.
“I have no idea what pulled him down, except something that followed him with loneliness. I think it was something with being alone,” she added. “But when I think that, why didn’t he call the new girlfriend that give him the lift?”
The 78-year-old performer also noticed a “change” in their conversations shortly before her son’s suicide.
“He was an introverted person. He was very shy, so I didn’t know either, except now when I listen back to our last conversations, I notice a change,” the Grammy winner recalled. “The last few times we talked, the conversations were different, and I didn’t know that until after the suicide.”
Turner’s candid interview comes four days after she published her memoir, My Love Story, on Oct. 15.
The revealing work details the music legend’s tumultuous marriage to Ike Turner, her health issues and her own attempt at suicide.
Turner said she took 50 sleeping pills after reaching a breaking point from Ike’s physical abuse, and she woke up the next day in a hospital.
“When I took those pills, I chose death, and I chose it honestly,” she wrote. “I was unhappy when I woke up.”
My Love Story is Turner’s second memoir.
