AWARD-WINNING singer Duffy has revealed why she had to take a step back from the limelight in an emotional Instagram post.
The Rockferry singer told fans she was held captive by an attacker, after being drugged and raped.
The news was broken on her verified Instagram page, broadcast to over 104k followers.
What Duffy said on Instagram
Duffy took to Instagram to post an explanation about where she disappeared to and why.
She wrote, “You can only imagine the amount of times I thought about writing this. The way I would write it, how I would feel thereafter. Well, not entirely sure why now is the right time, and what it is that feels exciting and liberating for me to talk. I cannot explain it.”
The post explained that a journalist has reached out to her, and in her words “told him everything this past summer”. She detailed how it felt “so amazing to finally speak”.
The singer explained, “The truth is, and please trust me I am ok and safe now, I was raped and drugged and held captive over some days. Of course I survived. The recovery took time. There’s no light way to say it.”
‘The sun now does shine’
Referring to her recovery process, Duffy commented, “I can you in the last decade, the thousands and thousands of days I committed to wanting to feel the sunshine in my heart again, the sun does now shine.
“You wonder why I did not choose to use my voice to express my pain? I did not want to show the world sadness in my eyes. I asked myself, how can I sing from the heart if it is broken?”
At the end of the post, Duffy asked that everyone “please respect this is a gentle move for me to make, for myself, and I do not want any intrusion to my family”.
She wrote that she wished for everyone to support her in making her speaking out a “positive experience”.
Releasing an interview
Towards the end of the Instagram post, the caption explained that if anyone had questions for Duffy, then she would like to answer them.
She wrote, “If you have any questions I would like to answer them, in the spoken interview, if I can.”
There are no further specific details regarding when this interview might be released or where it will be broadcast.
The history of Duffy
Duffy, whose real name is Aimee Anne Duffy, was born on 23 June 1984 in Bangor, Gwynedd, Wales.
Following the singles of Rockferry in 2007 and Mercy in 2008, Duffy released her debut album Rockferry in 2008, which entered the UK album chart at number one, becoming the best selling album in the UK that year.
The album was certified several times Platinum - for an album to go Platinum, it has to sell one million copies. Rockferry sold over seven million copies worldwide.
Rockferry bagged Duffy a variety of awards - the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album and three Brit Awards for British Breakthrough, Best British Female and Best British Album.
In 2010, Duffy released her second album, Endlessly. In February 2011, Duffy announced she would be taking an extended hiatus from music.
Since then, she has showcased a couple acting roles - her acting debut was in the 2010 film Patagonia and then appeared again in 2015 as Timi Yuro in Legend, a biographical crime thriller about the Kray Twins starring Tom Hardy.
In her role in Legend, Duffy portrays an American singer and contributed three songs to the soundtrack, including an original song called Whole Lot of Love. She also released a new song, Dear Heart, as a digital download on 11 September 2015.
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