Tragic Details About Billy Joel's Daughter Alexa Ray Joel

The following article discusses suicide.

As the daughter of Christie Brinkley and Billy Joel, Alexa Ray Joel was born with plenty going for her. But her privileged upbringing didn't protect her from everything. Alexa has lived through some devastating experiences, some of which are a product of her life in the spotlight. Among those is the media scrutiny she has received for being the daughter of a supermodel. More than once or twice, Alexa has had her looks cruelly compared to Brinkley's, when she has made it clear she has no interest in modeling.

Alexa's status as a musician and celeb daughter has also made her vulnerable to online stalking. Her case became so severe that her father hired bodyguards to ensure her safety. A woman was even arrested over the violent threats made against Alexa. As a woman in the public eye, Alexa has also had to respond to repeated claims about plastic surgery, even though she has always been open about getting a nose job.

On the other hand, she has suffered tragedies that were not related to her career and upbringing but to the human condition. While trying to numb the pain from heartbreak and untreated depression, Alexa accidentally overdosed in what was interpreted as an attempted suicide. The experience propelled her to seek help and use her platform to open the conversation about mental health in hopes of helping other young women. Alexa has faced many challenges over the years but has come out stronger.

In December 2009, Alexa Ray Joel took an large enough amount of a homeopathic medicine to send her to the hospital. A friend of Alexa's called 911, and an ambulance arrived at her New York apartment shortly after midnight. The accidental overdose was reported as an attempted suicide, but she denied she had tried to take her life. "I take full responsibility for what I've done. But at the same time, I wasn't trying to kill myself," she said on ABC News' "20/20" in 2010 (via Radar). 

A few after the incident, Joel opened up about her struggles with depression after breaking up with her former bandmate, Jimmy Riot. In the weeks that followed the hospitalization, she shared tips and insight on how to deal with what she called heartbreak-related depression on Facebook. In one post, she admitted she had been receiving professional help and wanted to pay it forward. "I'm still working through so much.. but helping people HELPS ME," she wrote.

When she took all those Traumeel pills, she had been looking to numb the pain and get some rest instead of being a burden to her loved ones during the holiday season. "I don't want to like call and bother anyone with this anymore," she said in the "20/20" interview. A year later, she felt her life was falling into place. "I'm in a great place this year, where you start accepting yourself," she told the New York Post. 

If you or anyone you know is having suicidal thoughts, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline by dialing 988 or by calling 1-800-273-TALK (8255)​.

For months in 2013, Alexa Ray Joel, then 27, was subjected to a slew of Facebook messages that became increasingly disturbing. Court documents showed that some of them contained "pedophilia, sadistic-sexual behavior, violent physical assaults, and murder," the New York Post reported. Christie Brinkley and Billy Joel were scared for their daughter's safety. "Her mother, Christie Brinkley, was terrified that someone would harm her baby," a source said. "Billy Joel was worried but focused."

Her father decided to take matters into his own hands. After turning to Paul McCartney for advice, Billy hired a European security firm to protect Alexa. The bodyguards tracked down a woman named Sheryl Finley, whom they found naked in the woods of Austin, Minnesota. The woman reportedly told authorities her intention was to get to know Alexa personally and hoped she wouldn't "object to meeting with her." She also allegedly said she hadn't planned to carry out the violent threats against Alexa "during this life."

Finley had reportedly received in-house psychiatric treatment for a few months in 2010. She received a felony charge for stalking to which she pleaded not guilty, according to The Telegraph. The outlet further reported that the alleged stalker used a fake Facebook account under the alias "Rick Steenfield" to send the threatening messages to Alexa. "We need to take the harassment and the threats that occur, via those digital means, very seriously," Austin Police Department Capt. Dave McKichan said.

Alexa Ray Joel didn't ask to be the daughter of an iconic Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, but she is, and having her looks compared to Christie Brinkley's has taken a toll. In 2007, she responded to a Perez Hilton post in which he dissected Alexa's looks, concluding that she's "not bad, actually, just no supermodel" (via People). Alexa, then 21, had a lot to say. On the now-defunct MySpace, she shared her frustration about being constantly compared to her mother.

While she wished she could just let these comments go, Alexa admitted she often felt the need to defend her looks. "My mom and I look completely different, and I'm OK with that. I like that I look unique, or more 'exotic' — I don't want to look like everybody else, and I also don't want to look like a supermodel," she wrote. She also criticized the media for seemingly pitying her for taking after Billy Joel instead of Brinkley when she had no problems resembling her father.

In her eyes, the "Piano Man" stands out. "I think he has a very soulful face — the face of someone with character and integrity — who has LIVED and has something important to say," she wrote. Alexa celebrated her unique beauty in 2017 when she posed for Sports Illustrated alongside her mom, Christie Brinkley, and Sailor Brinkley Cook, her half-sister. "We are all perfect, just as we are," she captioned an Instagram post about the shoot.

In April 2014, Alexa Ray Joel was performing the final show of a two-week run at the famous Upper East Side's Café Carlyle when she collapsed in front of the crowd. Minutes earlier, she had told concertgoers she was feeling a bit unwell but wanted to keep going. The then-28-year-old singer was rushed to New York Presbyterian Hospital. Doctors concluded the reason behind her fainting was vasovagal syncope, a harmless condition that causes heart rate and blood pressure to drop unexpectedly.

Two days later, Joel thanked those who attended the concert and shared her frustration about the outcome of her final show. "I was excited and determined to fulfill my final performance, and I really wanted to end my run with a bang, but this was not what I had in mind, and hope I have the opportunity to make it up to the wonderful audience very soon," she told Page Six in a statement. That wasn't the first time Joel had collapsed on stage.

Eight years earlier, Joel was unable to get onstage at New York's Marist College after feeling ill. On her MySpace, she explained that she had never fainted like that before. "I pretty much exhausted myself to the point that I couldn't do the show," she wrote (via ContactMusic). She admitted she had been feeling anxious and concluded her body was telling her to take it easy. "Something I haven't done in a while!" she said.

Even though Alexa Ray Joel has repeatedly shared she is happy with the way she looks, many still believe she's bluffing. Over the years, there have been plenty of rumors that she has gone to great lengths to change her appearance. In 2013, the Daily Mail speculated she had gotten breast implants when she attended the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in a low-cut top. TMZ went so far as to say she had completely transformed her appearance. Joel has consistently denied it.

After the articles came out, Joel took to Facebook to slam the outlets for their body-shaming. "I fervently believe that it should be every woman's imperative to love, accept, embrace, and celebrate their exterior," she wrote. The speculation continued into the following year, when she donned a figure-hugging outfit during a show. "The continuously-circulating rumors that I have had extensive 'face-work' and undergone breast-augmentation surgery is simply and entirely 100 percent false," she wrote on social media (via ABC News).

On the other hand, Joel had a nose job in April 2010, a procedure she never tried to hide. "[It] always bothered me a little bit. I was self-conscious of pictures taken from the side," she told People (via Yahoo!). Her decision to be open about her rhinoplasty is why she is so bothered by the plastic surgery rumors. "I've been very honest with the press, even when I had work done on my face," she told 25A Magazine in 2015.