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Eminem's Mother, Debbie Nelson Passes Away Of Lung Cancer At 69
Eminem had a rocky relationship with his mother Debbie Nelson who passed away on December 2, 2024. Read on to find out the details.
Debbie Nelson, mother of rapper Eminem, passed away at 69 after battling cancer.
According to reports from TMZ, the My Name Is rapper's mother passed away on Monday evening, December 2, due to complications from lung cancer in St. Joseph, Missouri. Her illness first surfaced in September.
Born in 1955, on a military base in Kansas, Nelson described her upbringing in a chaotic home environment in her 2008 memoir, My Son Marshall, My Son Eminem. Her parents divorced before she was 10 years old, leaving it to her, as the eldest of five siblings, to take on family responsibility at a very young age. At the age of 16, Nelson married Marshall Bruce Mathers Jr., father of Slim Shady. She gave birth to the Godzilla rapper two years later, in October 1972.
Her relationship with the Grammy-winning rapper, now 52, had been tumultuous over the years. He publicly ridiculed her in his 2002 song Cleanin' Out My Closet. Em's scathing lyrics about his mother prompted her to file a defamation lawsuit seeking 11 million USD. The court ruled in her favor but awarded her only a fraction of the amount after her legal fees were accounted for; she received around 1,600 USD.
Em has also elaborated on his complex relationship with his mother in other songs like My Name Is, My Mom, Insane, and an unreleased song called The Apple, among others. At one point, Debbie released a CD titled Set The Record Straight, where she responded to her son's many disparaging lyrics about her.
Despite their difficult relationship, Nelson said she wanted to make peace with her son, calling for moving on and never dwelling on past resentments. In 2013, Em extended an olive branch and apologized to his mother through his song Headlights. He acknowledged her role in his upbringing and expressed regret that he had not thanked her sooner.
In recent years, Debbie seemed to be supporting her son from afar. She took to social media and even a video message after Shady was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2022 to congratulate him. She expressed pride over all that he had accomplished, acknowledging the long road to get there.
"Marshall, I want to say, I could not let this day go by without congratulating you on your induction into the Hall of Fame. I love you very much. I knew you'd get there. It's been a long ride. I'm very, very proud of you," she said in the video, which has now been deleted.
Debbie Nelson is survived by her sons, Eminem and Nathan Mathers.
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