Particle.news
Download on the App Store

Bob Geldof Says Regret Over Telling His Children of Paula Yates’s Death Still Haunts Him

In a new RTÉ Radio 1 interview, the 74-year-old reflects on enduring grief from two heroin-related family deaths.

Overview

  • Geldof recounted learning in September 2000 that Paula Yates had died of a heroin overdose on daughter Pixie’s 10th birthday and said he now regrets the direct way he informed his children.
  • He said he brought the children to view their mother’s body and noted that bereavement professionals now consider such supervised viewing helpful, particularly for Tiger Lily, whom he later adopted.
  • Describing grief that still erupts, he recalled recently stopping at traffic lights when he suddenly sensed Peaches’s presence and began to weep.
  • He reflected that the pain when Yates left the marriage in 1995 felt worse than her death, and he kept going by deciding to focus on his children.
  • He said love has sustained him through loss and credited his later marriage to French actress Jeanne Marine with helping him endure.