Daughter of David Bowie claims she missed dad's final days after being 'forcibly removed' from family home

The daughter of David Bowie has revealed the trauma she experienced after being 'forcibly removed' from the family home before her famous father's death in 2016, which meant that she could not be with him when he died.

Now 25, Alexandra 'Lexi' Jones has spoken up about how two men 'well over six feet tall' dragged her from their New York home, after her influential father and supermodel mom Iman sent her away due to her eating disorder and other mental health issues.

This decision saw the then 14-year-old sent to a 'wilderness therapy' camp for struggling teens, which have since been described as 'abusive' by the adults who survived them, like Paris Hilton.

With teens ordered to dig latrines and learn to survive in the great outdoors at these camps without modern technology, this final order from dad Bowie sadly meant she was among the last people on Earth to learn he had died.

Recalling the moment before two men removed her from the house, Lexi shared: "My dad read a letter he had written. I don't really remember what it said, but I do remember the last line and it said, 'I'm sorry we have to do this'."

Then, she found herself fighting against two much stronger men. Lexi added: "They told me I could do this the easy way or the hard way. I chose the hard way. I resisted. I screamed. I held onto the table leg.

"They grabbed me, they put their hands on me, they pulled me away from everything I knew and I was screaming bloody murder. I was screaming for someone to help me, but no one did..."

Taking her story to Instagram, she explained at length how this experience had negatively affected her for years afterwards, with those 91 days at a wilderness therapy camp still weighing heavily on her mind.

There, the self-described 'city girl' was made to dig her own bathroom and count out loud as she used it so that staff could continue to monitor her behavior, while also sleeping on just a tarp laid on the ground with a sleeping bag.

It was only when she was moved onto the next troubled teens center, a residential facility, that she found out her dad had died.

David Bowie's daughter Lexi, 25, says she was 'forcibly removed' from family home and sent to 'abusive' teen treatment centre which resulted in her missing her father's final days ahead of his tragic death from cancer pic.twitter.com/Re2uTi9EHr

— G R I F T Y (@GriftReport) February 23, 2026

Recalling her final memory of her dad, Lexi, herself now an artist, said: "I had the luxury of speaking to him two days before, on his birthday.

"I told him I loved him, and he said it back, and we both knew.

"Then I saw the post, the one that said something like, David Bowie passed away, surrounded by his whole family."

Lexi said she still lives with the emotional consequences of being excluded at this pivotal moment in her life, adding: "It made me physically ill because, yeah, the whole family was there. Except for me."

Lexi said this pattern of being repeatedly sent away from home as a child, after repeated incidents with drugs and other dangerous situations, had changed her. She said: "I was forced to look inward before I even had a chance to look outward. I

"I had to understand emotions before I understood algebra. I had to become fluent in the language of healing before I even knew who I was."

Her lengthy and emotional post about her traumatic childhood, where 'adults would talk to [her] differently' because of her father, caused a wave of love from her followers, including Cara Delevingne who left a string of love hearts.

Meanwhile on X, many users thought this moment was a 'final act' of love from Bowie to his troubled daughter, with one person pointing out: "Her father is dying of cancer and one of his final acts is to have an intervention of sorts before his death.

"Bowie was a recovered addict himself. She should look at this as an act of love and consider what part she played in this."