Alexa Ray Joel Talks Suicide Scare

Alexa Ray Joel spoke out against reports that her suicide scare was a result of a fight with mom Christie Brinkley, blaming it instead on “heartbreak-related depression.” On her Facebook fan page, Joel called Brinkley and dad Billy Joel “my role models and best friends,” slamming the press for its “harsh” treatment of Brinkley, “the kindest woman I’ve ever known," the New York Daily News reports.

Though she doesn’t specifically blame Brinkley’s ex-husband Peter Cook for starting the rumors, she does exhort people to “consider the source.” Now that the trauma is behind her, Joel plans to help young girls with similar problems and go back to school to study psychology, she writes, adding that “heartbreak-related depression” is “a very serious and painful condition that often gets ‘swept under the carpet.’”