WAKING one morning, Debi Richens, now 61, opened her phone to multiple notifications.
Her daughter, Claire, had – like – posted a very public message shaming her and stating they were now estranged.
Debi Richens has also been cut off by familyCredit: Supplied
Brooklyn Beckham and Nicola Peltz – he released a nuclear statementCredit: AFP
For Debi, the message – which she can still recall pretty much word-for-word – came as a horrifying surprise.
It was 11 years ago and the mum-and-daughter have still not spoken.
“She laid into me,” grief coach Debi, from Thatcham, West Berks., says. “I believe I was slandered publicly.
“To my mind it was a complete fabrication.”
The crux of Claire’s message – similarly to Brooklyn’s – featured weddings.
Her daughter, now 34, was soon to be wed and she said her mum was “manipulating the table layouts.”
Debi admits she did have views on where people were sitting.
She says: “I didn’t mind where I was sitting but elderly relatives were near the back, they might not have heard the speeches and so on.”
Brooklyn had a similar gripe. He says mum Victoria Beckham criticised the seating arrangements, ruining his big day in April 2022 to wife Nicola Peltz, 31.
on Tuesday night to the world’s astonishment he wrote: “During the wedding planning, my mum went so far as to call me ‘evil’ because Nicola and I chose to include my Nanny Sandra, and Nicola’s Naunni at our table, because they both didn’t have their husbands.”
David Beckham, pictured in Davos, todayCredit: Reuters
Part of Brooklyn Beckham’s statementCredit: Instagram/BrooklynPeltzBeckham
He also said his mum “humiliated” him by “ hijacking ” his first dance and dancing “inappropriately” and accused her of “[cancelling] making Nicola’s dress in the eleventh hour despite how excited she was to wear her design, forcing her to urgently find a new dress.”
Claire’s wedding dress was another thing which led to her eventually cutting ties with her mum, who she’d had a rocky relationship with since the age of 14 after Debi split with her dad and her daughter chose to live with him.
In the Facebook message Claire says her mum body-shamed her – something her mum vehemently denies.
Debi explains: “We’d been looking at wedding dresses and I said something along the lines of ‘Remember you’ve just had a baby and your body is carrying baby weight’. I didn’t call her fat, I was honest.”
Asked if she understood why Claire might be offended by this, she says no. “I was just stating facts,” she says. “I didn’t call her fat. I would’ve liked it if someone said that about me.”
Claire’s post – which also disinvited her from Claire’s forthcoming nuptials – upset her so much she immediately deleted it and blocked the “30 people who had commented”.
At first I was, as I imagine Victoria is, like a headless chicken.
Debi
What was more shocking to her was that a few weeks beforehand she, Claire, her grandchild and other family members had met at a pub. “We had a lovely lunch together,” she reflects. “I couldn’t have anticipated the fallout. I didn’t know that would be the last time I would see my daughter.”
Now, more than a decade on, she neither blames herself nor her daughter – attributing the estrangement to a variety of factors.
“But it used to absolutely floor me,” she says. “At first I was, as I imagine Victoria is, like a headless chicken.
“I had met my grandchild five times and adored her. Suddenly, seeing a child with a pram broke me. I would go the other way. Doing the supermarket shopping took three times as long. I would avoid people that looked like her.
“Now I will have conversations with these people.”
Being cut off from your child is one of society’s last taboos.
Debi
She believes the estrangement ultimately came about from a difference in perception and understanding as a result of generational disconnect.
Debi is a young Boomer and her daughter is a Milleniall.
Meanwhile, David and Victoria are both firmly Generation X and Brooklyn Generation Z.
“There’s a societal disconnect in how we speak to each other,” says Debi. “Children are saying ‘I want to live like this’ and setting boundaries. I think it’s a consequence of education. It wouldn’t have happened when I was younger. Society is different. It’s causing estrangement to become a chasm.”
She says she has wondered the big question: “Where did I go wrong?”
“Being cut off from your child is one of society’s last taboos,” she says. “I imagine the Beckham’s are feeling the same. You love and nurture a child and to tell people ‘my daughter doesn’t talk to me’ is awful.
“Because, of course, I’ve reached out to Claire – especially in the early years – but she isn’t interested. She says ‘you know what you did.’ But I don’t.”
Debi agrees she did make mistakes, especially following her divorce, when she was exhausted and grieving the end of her marriage.
She initially thought she was unique in her experience but soon learnt she wasn’t. So she set up an online support group which within months had 2,500 members.
Brooklyn's statement in full
“I have been silent for years and made every effort to keep these matters private.
“Unfortunately, my parents and their team have continued to go to the press, leaving me with no choice but to speak for myself and tell the truth about only some of the lies that have been printed.
“I do not want to reconcile with my family. I’m not being controlled, I’m standing up for myself for the first time in my life.
“For my entire life, my parents have controlled narratives in the press about our family.
“The performative social media posts, family events and inauthentic relationships have been a fixture of the life I was born into.
“Recently, I have seen with my own eyes the lengths that they’ll go through to place countless lies in the media, mostly at the expense of innocent people, to preserve their own facade.
“But I believe the truth always comes out.
“My parents have been trying endlessly to ruin my relationship since before my wedding, and it hasn’t stopped.
“My mum cancelled making Nicola’s dress in the eleventh hour despite how excited she was to wear her design, forcing her to urgently find a new dress.
“Weeks before our big day, my parents repeatedly pressured and attempted to bribe me into signing away the rights to my name, which would have affected me, my wife, and our future children.
“They were adamant on me signing before my wedding date because then the terms of the deal would be initiated. My holdout affected the payday, and they have never treated me the same since.
“During the wedding planning, my mum went so far as to call me ‘evil’ because Nicola and I chose to include my Nanny Sandra, and Nicola’s Naunni at our table, because they both didn’t have their husbands.
“Both of our parents had their own tables equally adjacent to ours.
“The night before our wedding, members of my family told me that Nicola was ‘not blood’ and ‘not family’.
“Since the moment I started standing up for myself with my family, I’ve received endless attacks from my parents, both privately and publicly, that were sent to the press on their orders.
“Even my brothers were sent to attack me on social media, before they ultimately blocked me out of nowhere this last Summer.
“My mum hijacked my first dance with my wife, which had been planned weeks in advance to a romantic love song.
“In front of our 500 wedding guests, Marc Anthony called me to the stage, where in the schedule was planned to be my romantic dance with my wife but instead my mum was waiting to dance with me instead.
“She danced very inappropriately on me in front of everyone. I’ve never felt more uncomfortable or humiliated in my entire life.
“We wanted to renew our vows so we could create new memories of our wedding day that bring us joy and happiness, not anxiety and embarrassment.
“My wife has been consistently disrespected by my family, no matter how hard we’ve tried to come together as one.
“My mum has repeatedly invited women from my past into our lives in ways that were clearly intended to make us both uncomfortable.
“Despite this, we still travelled to London for my dad’s birthday and were rejected for a week as we waited in our hotel room trying to plan quality time with him.
“He refused all of our attempts, unless it was at his big birthday party with a hundred guests and cameras at every corner.
“When he finally agreed to see me, it was under the condition that Nicola wasn’t invited. It was a slap in the face.
“Later, when my family travelled to LA, they refused to see me at all.
“My family values public promotion and endorsements above all else. Brand Beckham comes first.
“Family ‘love’ is decided by how much you post on social media, or how quickly you drop everything to show up and pose for a family photo opp, even if it’s at the expense of our professional obligations.
“We’ve gone out of our way for years to show up and support at every fashion show, every party, and every press activity to show “our perfect family.”
“But the one time my wife asked for my mum’s support to save displaced dogs during the LA fires, my mum refused.
“The narrative that my wife controls me is completely backwards. I have been controlled by my parents for most of my life. I grew up with overwhelming anxiety.
“For the first time in my life, since stepping away from my family, that anxiety has disappeared. I wake up every morning grateful for the life I chose, and have found peace and relief.
“My wife and I do not want a life shaped by image, press, or manipulation.
“All we want peace, privacy and happiness for us and our future family.”
She says: “It’s actually shockingly common. You just need to look at Prince Harry.”
Meanwhile, charity Stand Alone says approximately one in five of the UK population is estranged from a family member.
And her advice for Victoria and David? “There is a way back. But they all need to find a middle ground.
“Everyone needs to stop flinging bows and arrows in public. They’ve lived out their life in public but they need to heal in private to address the damage.
“Still, my heart goes out to them and especially to Victoria as a fellow mum. Because, seeing that post, must have shattered her. Losing a child to estrangement is an awful kind of grief – and that’s what it is. Grief.”
Some names have been changed.
David and Victoria Beckham pictured last yearCredit: Getty
Victoria Beckham and Nicola Peltz, pictured together in early 2024Credit: Getty
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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