The Mathers family has lost a family member.
Eminem’s mother Debbie Nelson has died, his rep confirmed to E! News. She was 69 years old.
Over the years, Eminem (a.k.a. Marshall Mathers III) has detailed his complicated relationship with his mother in his music.
In his 1999 song “My Name Is” from The Slim Shady LP, for instance, the Grammy winner recalled telling his mom he’d “grow up to be a famous rapper / make a record about doin’ drugs and name it after her.”
According to ABC News, Debbie sued Eminem for defamation later that year and she received a $25,000 settlement (though the outlet reported the majority of the money she received went to her attorney). She also fired back at the rapper in the 2001 track “Dear Marshall” on ID-X’s Set the Record Straight.
“It does hurt,” Debbie told Inside Edition in 2001 about her son’s music, denying allegations of popping pills and neglect. “God knows I don’t deserve it.”
However, the tension didn’t end there. In 2002, Eminem dropped “Cleanin’ Out My Closet” in which he asked listeners to “envision witnessin’ your mama poppin’ prescription pills in the kitchen” and described the estranged relationship his mother had with him and his daughter Hailie Jade.
“And Hailie’s gettin’ so big now, you should see her she’s beautiful/ But you’ll never see her, she won’t even be at your funeral,” the recording artist rapped, “See, what hurts me the most is you won’t admit you was wrong / B–ch, do your song, keep tellin’ yourself that you was a mom! But how dare you try to take what you didn’t help me to get / You selfish b–ch, I hope you f–kin burn in hell for this s–t.”
Then in 2009, Eminem released “My Mom” in which he rapped about Debbie’s alleged drug use and how it affected his own battle with addiction (he celebrated 16 years of sobriety in April).
“My mom loved Valium and lots of drugs,” he said on the single. “That’s why I am like I am ‘cause I’m like her.”
Despite the lyrics, Eminem later noted his mom still had a place in his heart.
“Even though we don’t really speak, she is my mother, I do love her,” the 52-year-old said in a 2011 BET interview, “and I think I got a better understanding of what she was going through or what she may be going through.”
Then in 2013, Eminem dropped his track “Headlights” in which he apologized to his mom.
“’Cause to this day we remain estranged, and I hate it though / ‘Cause you ain’t even get to witness your grandbabies grow,” he stated on the track. “But I’m sorry, mama for ‘Cleanin’ Out My Closet’ / At the time I was angry, rightfully? Maybe so / Never meant that far to take it though / ‘Cause now I know it’s not your fault, and I’m not makin’ jokes / That song I no longer play at shows / And I cringe every time it’s on the radio.”
And when Eminem was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022, his mother sent a loving message to him and Hailie.
“Marshall, I could not let this day go by without congratulating you on your induction to the Hall of Fame,” she said in part of a video shared by the social media account The Shadyverse. “I love you very much. I knew you’d get there. And it’s been a long ride.”
To learn more about Debbie and the rest of Eminem’s family, keep reading.
Born Kimberly Ann Scott, the Michigan native was Eminem’s high school sweetheart. She welcomed their daughter Hailie Jade in 1995.
Kim was married to the rapper from 1999 to 2001, and briefly again in 2006. Their tumultuous relationship has been referenced in several of Eminem’s songs, including “’97 Bonnie & Clyde,” “Puke” and “Bad Husband.”
“In our relationship, there’s a pattern,” Kim said of their on-and-off romance in a 2007 interview with 20/20. ” We’ll have two good years and then it will go bad for some reason. It’s like a two-year max with us and we hadn’t reached the two years yet. I just didn’t want to rush into anything before the two years.”
However, Kim noted that Eminem has always been an “excellent” father.
“He loves the kids very much,” she shared. “He’s always lending a helping hand.”
Eminem and Kim welcomed Hailie on Dec. 25, 1995. According to music star, her birth was a “real wake-up call” to “get my a– in gear.”
“Everything that I am doing right now is for Hailie,” he told Q magazine in 2001. “The money—it’s for her college.”
She spent most of her youth under Eminem’s 15,000-square-foot roof in the Detroit suburbs, before attending Michigan State University to study psychology. There, she met her now-husband Evan McClintock, who she married in May 2024 after getting engaged the year prior.
“She’s doing good,” Eminem said of Hailie during a 2020 episode of Hotboxin’ With Mike Tyson, adding that the influencer—who now goes by Hailie Jade—graduated from college with a 3.9 GPA. “She’s made me proud for sure.”
In October 2024, Hailie announced her pregnancy with her and Evan’s first child, a baby boy.
She was adopted by Eminem in the early aughts due to her mother’s struggles with addiction. “I have full custody of my niece and joint custody of Hailie,” the 8 Mile star told Rolling Stone in 2004. “I was always there for Hailie, and my niece has been a part of my life ever since she was born. Me and Kim pretty much had her, she’d live with us wherever we was at.”
Having been largely raised by Eminem, the Oakland University alum calls him “dad” and had him accompany her down the aisle when she wed Matt Moeller in June 2023.
“He wasn’t going to miss that,” she told People after the nuptials, during which Hailie served as a Maid of Honor. “None of this would have been possible without my dad. I’m beyond blessed.”
Her mother passed away in 2016 at the age of 41.
InstagramKim welcomed Stevie on April 16, 2002, with her then-boyfriend Eric Hartter. Eminem legally adopted Stevie in 2005, when he reconciled with Kim.
Stevie came out as nonbinary in August 2021, sharing in a TikTok video that they identify using “all pronouns.”
They added in the caption, “forever growing and changing.”
Born in 1955 at a military base in Kansas, Debbie is the mother of Eminem.
She married the “Without Me” artist’s father Marshall Bruce Mathers Jr. when she was 15, according to her 2008 memoir My Son Marshall, My Son Eminem. She became pregnant with Eminem 16 months later and relocated to Michigan, where her maternal grandmother lived.
Debbie and Eminem’s strained relationship has been documented in several of his songs, including his 2002 smash hit “Cleanin’ Out My Closet.” In the track, he alleged that Debbie abused prescription pills when he was young—which she denied in her autobiography.
“What mother wants to be known as a pill-popping alcoholic who lives on welfare?” she wrote. “None of it was true, but the fibs kept getting bigger, and ultimately Marshall and I became estranged.”
However, Eminem has since expressed regret in airing out his family drama. In his 2013 song “Headlights,” he rapped, “I went in headfirst, never thinking about who, what I said hurt / In what verse, my mom probably got it the worst.”
Nelson died at the age of 69 in 2024 following a battle with cancer.
