Duffy rocked by devastating death of loved one after kidnapping and rape ordeal saw her quit fame
DUFFY has been rocked by another tragedy as her mum has passed away.
The Welsh singer, who disappeared from the spotlight ten years ago after being drugged, raped and held captive, has suddenly lost her mum, Joyce, who was 69.
Mail Online reports that Joyce died after suffering from a stomach ulcer.
Duffy – who was recently seen for the first time in ten years – is understood to have a strained relationship with her family after she isolated herself following her traumatic ordeal, but she reportedly had been rebuilding her bond with her mum.
The pair were said to be in telephone contact before Joyce suddenly died.
In 2020 the singer, now 40, left fans stunned when she opened up about being “raped and drugged and held captive over some days” in a shocking Instagram statement.
Up until that point, her fanbase had been puzzled by her disappearance from the spotlight following such smash hits as Mercy.
She was tipped to be the new Amy Winehouse, and was a contemporary of Adele.
But five years ago, she explained the harrowing reason why she disappeared from public view.
She revealed in a brave social media post at the time:
“Many of you wonder what happened to me, where did I disappear to and why.
“A journalist contacted me, he found a way to reach me and I told him everything this past summer.
“He was kind and it felt so amazing to finally speak.
“The truth is, and please trust me I am ok and safe now, I was raped and drugged and held captive over some days.
“Of course I survived. The recovery took time. There’s no light way to say it.
“But I can tell you in the last decade, the thousands and thousands of days I committed to wanting to feel the sunshine in my heart again, the sun does now shine.”
Duffy would later reveal she had been drugged at a restaurant on her birthday before being taken to another country, where she suffered a horrifying four-week ordeal.
“Rape is like living murder. You are alive but dead,” Duffy said. “All I can say is it took an extremely long time, sometimes feeling never-ending, to reclaim the shattered pieces of me.”
Music lovers were thrilled to see Duffy again when she was seen lip-syncing to her biggest hit Mercy in a video posted by Emotion HQ.
They wrote: “Some of you asked if Duffy was really doing a UK Garage remix with us…”
One fan gushed: “Duffy! Where have you been?!”
Another added: “So good to see her face.”
And a third chipped in: “Great to see Duffy back what a tremendous singer she is.”