The famous blues and rock singer-songwriter Eric Clapton he felt the saying "what does not kill you, makes you stronger" on his own skin. What marked his life was a strong conscience concern for the untimely death of his four-year-old son, but although there were days when he did not have the strength to get out of bed, he somehow managed to move on. writes "Style".

Eric Clapton was born on March 30, 1945 in Ripley, England, the first son of a sixteen-year-old. Patricia Molly Clapton and a twenty-four-year-old soldier Edward Walter, who left his family after the birth of Eric. So Eric grew up in his grandmother Rosa's house, long believing that his mother was actually his older sister. When he was eight, his mother remarried and moved to Canada, leaving little Eric with his grandmother. He got his first guitar from his grandmother for his thirteenth birthday. Although this instrument seemed heavy and ugly to him, he first took it in his hands when he was seventeen and formed his first band, The Roosters.

"My childhood was everything, just not just growing up. Although my grandmother was trying to make up for everything I was missing, I felt a great emptiness in my soul and heart. I did not know who my father was, and I thought my mother was my older sister. It was not all that scary until I went to school and my mother left the family home forever. Although those were some of the times when people were much calmer, children can be as vicious as any adult can be. They called me derogatory names, ran after me and teased me whenever they arrived. When I came home from school, I ran to my room and cried for hours so that no one would see me. "From those tears came the desire to start playing music," said the musician.

Although at first it was difficult for him to fit in with other children, playing the guitar brought him a popularity he had never dreamed of.

"When I started playing the guitar at the age of seventeen, everyone suddenly fell in love with me and greeted me on the street, which hurt me a little. "Because of the uncertainty, even then I decided to create a world in which I would be the main one," Clapton explained.

The girls were in love with his talent for music and in his early youth he had many loves for which he suffered. Many of the girls he met left a mark on his heart.

"From the age of seventeen to twenty-five, I lived my life to the fullest. I did everything - I drank, took drugs and changed women. I fell in love with some of them, and some of them I did not even remember the names of. "I created beautiful songs, and some of them are big hits even today," the singer was honest.

In the seventies of the last century, Clapton began his solo career, which was really successful. But on the other hand, his private life began to fall apart. His first great love was Patty Boyd, the wife of his best friend - George Harrison.

"Little by little, I became obsessed. Just like when something can not get out of your head, no matter how hard you try not to think about it. "The fact that she was my best friend's wife made me feel weird - bitter and sweet at the same time," said Eric. .

"I have been thinking for a long time what to do. It's not that I did not fight, but every day I felt a growing need to take Patty in my arms and be her own. Their marriage was falling apart anyway, and I thought I had nothing to lose. I had no choice, I had to do something. Some may think I was selfish, but I was not. I wanted to end the agony that all three of us were constantly feeling, which hung like a black cloud over our heads. The two of us were already in a relationship and it seems to me that we were not discreet at all. I decided to be a gentleman and take all the blame on myself. "When I told George we were together, it seemed to me that he already knew that," recalled the legendary musician, who, like most rock stars, faced addictions.

"I do not know how I got into all this. When you try heroin for the first time, it is very difficult to resist it later, and those seventies were cursed in every sense of the word. "I was constantly on drugs, and then I decided it was time to stop being stupid and find a way to help myself."

Together with his beloved Patty, Eric retired to his estate in England for a while, and his beloved took care of the musician and did everything he could to cure him of his heroin addiction. She succeeded in this with her unconditional love, and the couple got married in a private ceremony in 1979. However, this musical genius began to plunge into a new vice.

"It took me a long time to admit that I was an alcoholic. After the heroin, the drink came as a light party, but I drank a lot. I could not imagine a day without a drink. When I first realized that I could not sing in an alcoholic state, I called my producer and told him that I had a problem with alcohol. "I was thinking about suicide then," said Eric.

With the help of friends and his wife, he went to Minnesota for treatment in 1982 and spent less than a year there, before returning to work full-time.

And just when everyone thought his life was completely mediocre, in 1984 he admitted that he was in a relationship with the model Yvonne Kelly, with whom he had a daughter Ruth a year later, whom the musician did not want to recognize until the early XNUMXs. Quarrels between him and Patty became more frequent because she could not get pregnant, and in the meantime Eric had a son Conor with the Italian actress Lori del Santo. Eventually, Eric and Petty divorced peacefully.

"I wanted Patty to get pregnant, we tried everything, but it just didn't work out. I loved children more than anything, and she became unbearable and seemed to no longer want to fight for our offspring. Lori appeared as someone who wants and can fulfill my great wish. I was not in love with her, but over time I fell in love with her. When Connor was born, I told her she was the woman of my life. My divorce went smoothly, and I am grateful to my dearest Patty for saving my life twice. I am also grateful that he understood my need to be a father. "She is a wonderful and great person."

One gloomy morning in March 1991, terrible news awoke Clapton. The cry of his mistress was the reason for the musician's long-term insomnia.

"Whatever I have done in life, no matter how much time has passed, I will never stop crying when I remember that dark day when my son died. I remember I was in our apartment in New York. The phone rang. I heard a scream and then something like the roar of a lioness. I could not understand what Lori was talking about, and when she recovered a little she said, 'Connor is dead!' I could not believe that a four-year-old child had died, and then when he explained to me that he had fallen out of the forty-ninth floor window, I realized that he was no more.

I went to her immediately, the police had already arrived, and the child's body had been taken away. I went to a nearby bar, ordered blueberry juice, cried all day and all night, and then went to the morgue to identify the body. The mass was so big, and he was so small on it. Although his body was torn to pieces, fortunately his face remained unharmed. He looked so calm, as if asleep. "It was terrible and it was a huge pain," Clapton described through tears.

For the next ten years, Eric retired and quietly suffered for his dearest son, and wrote the song "Tears In Heaven," which won him six Grammy Awards. He did not leave home for years, he fought with himself, with his demons, but his work helped him recover.

"I can no longer cry for my fate. It was really hard for me, I did not have the strength to get out of bed, my life had no meaning, but I had to move on. I worked hard and that was the only thing that made me happy. And then, I met her… ", he said, who at the end of 1999 met 23-year-old Melia McKenry who with his youth restored his desire for life.

"Her positive energy entangled me in a spider web. I could only hear her voice for hours. Her skin was velvety and smelled of vanilla. "I did not take the smile off my face," recalled the singer-songwriter, who on January 1, 2002, married his new girlfriend, with whom he has three daughters - Julie Rose, Eli May and Sophie Bell.