Iman has spoken candidly about grieving her late husband David Bowie, and why she finds it helpful to reframe memories of their time together.
The former supermodel, 67, who stars on the cover of British Vogue’s January issue, opened up about her grieving process in an accompanying interview, in which she revealed that her husband’s death in 2016 meant “grief came to visit and stayed for a while”.
However, according to Iman, who acknowledged that “grief has no expiration date,” what helped was the way she experienced memories of her husband, as she explained that, instead of fearing they would make her sad, she let them bring her joy.
“Instead of fearing and thinking: ‘Oh, God, [that memory] is going to break my heart,’ just let it bring joy to you,” she said.
The ability to grieve privately, in the New York Catskills home she shared with Bowie, has also been an important part of her grieving process, according to Iman.
However, she wasn’t always given the space to grieve Bowie’s death in private, as she told the outlet that, after her husband’s death, the privacy with which the family had lived their life changed overnight, and it became “too much”.
“It was too much. Too much. We lived a very private life and suddenly it felt like there was a target on mine and my daughter’s head,” she recalled. “It got to the point where we had to leave our home [in New York City] because the public were always at the front door. Which I admire. I get it. But there was a point where it was like: ‘Okay, go home now.’
“You had people who would take your picture, sell it and then come to you and say: ‘I feel your pain,’” she continued. “And, I’m like: ‘No, b**ch, you don’t feel my pain, get away from me.’”
While reflecting on her and her husband’s relationship, Iman also discussed her refusal to refer to Bowie, who died from liver cancer, as her “late” husband.
“He is not my ‘late husband’. He is my husband,” she said, adding that she doesn’t “mind at all being referred to as ‘David Bowie’s wife’”.
But, according to Iman, that doesn’t mean she and Bowie didn’t have their own separate identities, as she noted that the singer-songwriter always introduced her by her name, rather than as “his wife”.
“I always remind people that I existed before I met him. And he was also very particular. He never introduced me by saying: ‘Meet my wife.’ He’d always say: ‘Meet Iman, my wife.’ So we both already had our own identity. We were separate but together,” she explained.
This is not the first time that Iman has opened up about Bowie’s passing, and her refusal to describe him as her “late husband,” as she previously told People that she would not marry again because she “still feels married”.
Bowie and Iman married in 1992 after being introduced by a mutual friend, a set-up that the supermodel described as “destiny”. The pair welcomed their daughter, Alexandria “Lexi” Jones, 22, in 2000.
