Elton John reveals that he still struggles with trauma from childhood and can ‘explode at any moment’

Legendary entertainer, Sir Elton John has revealed he still struggles with the trauma of his childhood.  The 74-year-old singer said the trauma of his childhood inspired his parenting style to be the polar opposite towards his own children. Elton who shares sons Zachary, 10, and Elijah, eight, with husband David Furnish, said they are being raised to be ‘loved every second of the day’ and not fearing their parents like he did.  In an interview with Guardian, he said; 

‘We never hit them or lose our temper with them. When they’re bad, they lose their pocket money, or their electronic stuff for a week – but they don’t get punished physically or mentally. ‘We talk it through with them. And they’re very happy children. I was always afraid of my parents, and I didn’t want my children to ever be afraid of me. ‘They’re going to feel embraced and loved every second of the day; they’re not going to be beaten and have those scars for the rest of their lives.’

Recounting how worried he was thinking it was ‘too late’ for him to have children, Elton averred that his sons came at ‘the right time’ and gave him a ‘purpose in life’.  During the height of his fame, Sir Elton struggled with his temper especially while abusing cocaine and alcohol. The singer who has been sober for 30 years, admitted that the tendency to ‘explode’ is still within him.  He said; 

‘My behaviour was so erratic and so unpredictable. And it’s still in me, to explode at any moment.  ‘I’ve been trying to work on that for a long time and I’ve got a wonderful husband who knows how to get me out of that stuff. I think it’s an artistic thing – artists can be so self-destructive sometimes, for no reason. I can have a day when everything in my whole life is going so well, and I get up and I feel like the world is against me. Why, I do not know.’

The issues, he says, stem from his childhood, adding: ‘The self-loathing, not having any self-esteem, that all comes from when I was a kid.’ In his memoir, Elton had revealed that his mother beat him with a wire brush while potty training him and his father hit him for taking his school blazer off the wrong way, which left him ‘walking on eggshells’. He wrote; 

‘All my life, until I became sober, I was afraid of talking to anybody. They asked me when I went to treatment how I felt and I said: “I don’t know, I don’t feel anything.”

‘I came to defrost, as it were, and discovered I did have feelings, and they went back a long time. And I think it stays with you for the whole of your life … I just have terrible feelings about myself; I feel bad about myself sometimes.’