In her gripping new memoir, Best Foot Forward, ex-wife Shirley Ballas opens up about the funeral of her separated father, who left the family when she was two.
TV star Shirley Ballas got “disdainful stares” from her estranged dad’s family at his funeral after she described him as a deadbeat.
In her gripping new memoir, Best Foot Forward, she writes: “I was waiting to feel something, to have any sort of reaction to his passing despite everything that had gone before, but none came.
I attended his funeral because I thought some people were staring at me, which is probably because I had just released my autobiography, which I had described as a “deadbeat dad.”
I apologize for ever including that phrase in the book because it may have appeared horribly overprinted, but I’m always open and honest about how it turned out for me as a father.
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She claims that her father, George, who was referred to as Andy and passed away in 2021 at the age of 83, left the family home when she was two and was largely absent.
He and her mother Audrey “had a volatile relationship with explosive arguments that his drinking caused.” She continues, “Off he went and lived his life, getting married three more times after my mother divorced him.” It was simpler to refer to him as Andy than Dad or Daddy because of how distant our relationship was frequently.
I still feel bad that he didn’t take our time and step up. Because of how my mother was treated, I’m angry with him. When they brought in his coffin, “She claims that she had a” slight wobble” at the funeral, but it quickly passed.
However, it appeared to continue afterward. His wife passed away shortly after his death, according to Shirley, and his sister, Barbara, called me. You have a right to your father’s care, she said. He said, “I’ll take nothing now that he’s dead, and he gave me nothing when he was alive.” I don’t want it if I give it to someone else.
I only wanted a picture of him because I prefer to have one. But I couldn’t get one because they refused to give me one.
In her memoir, the TV star bravely confessed to having suicidal thoughts while battling depression for the first time.
The 64-year-old admitted that she found herself “heading down the same route” as her brother David, who tragically took his own life in 2003, aged 44.
- Shirley Ballas’ Best Foot Forward, which was released by BBC Books on September 11 for £2.
