David Bowie and Iman’s daughter, Alexandra “Lexi” Jones, has opened up about her distressing experience in the troubled teen industry, which kept her from her father’s deathbed in 2016.

Early Struggles and Intervention

The 25-year-old artist detailed on Instagram how, at age 14, authorities forcibly removed her from home amid battles with depression, substance abuse, and an eating disorder. Following Bowie’s 2014 liver cancer diagnosis, Lexi spiraled into heavy drinking as a form of escape.

“For me, it wasn’t about fun,” she explained in a video. “I wasn’t experimenting, I was escaping—from my complicated mind, my complicated family, my complicated school. When the party ended for everyone else, I kept going. And I drank and got high alone.”

She described becoming someone who lashed out and treated others cruelly when unmet expectations arose. Lexi recounted her father reading her a letter outlining the decision to send her to treatment. Soon after, two men entered the home, restrained her after a struggle, and transported her in a black SUV.

“I felt stripped of any right to stay in my own life,” she recalled. “By the time the door shut, my parents were already gone.”

Life in Treatment Programs

Lexi endured 91 days in a wilderness therapy program, mastering outdoor survival skills, before transferring to a Utah rehabilitation center for over a year. Bowie passed away during her stay there.

She last spoke with him two days prior, on his birthday. “I told him I loved him and he said it back, and we both knew,” Lexi shared, expressing deep pain upon reading the announcement that he died surrounded by family—excluding her.

At his side were son Duncan Jones, from Bowie’s marriage to ex-wife Angie Bowie, and wife Iman. Upon returning home, Lexi relapsed into old habits and faced another removal.

“The mental and emotional manipulation I experienced is something I will not forget,” she stated. “I won’t pretend it didn’t happen because that is abuse too.”

Concerns Over Troubled Teen Industry

The troubled teen industry encompasses various youth programs for at-risk adolescents, but these often underregulated facilities face growing scrutiny. Paris Hilton has publicly described her ordeals in 1990s programs, alleging force-feeding of medications, violent restraints, hallway dragging, and solitary confinement.

Hilton testified that such facilities promised healing and support yet restricted speech, movement, and even window views for years.