Sinéad O’Connor’s Friends Were Concerned She Would End Up Like Her Idol, Prince

During the late Sinéad O’Connor’s lifetime, the singer saw a music mentor in the late “Purple Rain” singer, Prince, and according to her friends, “she copied everything he did.” Due to how much she followed after him, Sinéad’s friends feared she would die like Prince.

Prince, who wrote a song Sinéad is very famous for, died from an accidental fentanyl overdose in 2016. The music icon ingested fake Vicodin that contained the substance in harmful amounts. Prince’s death got Sinéad’s friends worried because their friend was threading that part, as well—being suicidal and having addiction struggles.

Sinéad relied on prescription drugs

Sinéad admitted on social media that she was “heavily addicted” to prescription drugs in managing emotional distress. Years ago, the singer shared a disturbing video from her hotel room in New Jersey on her Facebook page. “I’m all by myself and there’s absolutely nobody in my life except… my psychiatrist… and that’s the only thing keeping me alive at the moment,” Sinéad said in the video, sobbing.

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After her son died in 2022, Sinéad was distraught and made some disturbing tweets behind an unverified account about dying— which she later apologized for. “I’ve decided to follow my son. There is no point living without him. Everything I touch, I ruin. I only stayed for him. And now he’s gone,” she tweeted. She later followed up with another tweet that she was fine and on her way to the hospital, but not without subtly referencing that she wanted to die.

“I am with cops now on way to hospital. I’m sorry I upset everyone. I am lost without my kid and I hate myself. Hospital will help a while,” she wrote. “But I’m going to find Shane. This is just a delay.”

Sinéad changed her name like Prince did

In tribute to her idol, Prince, Sinéad announced she was changing her name to Magda Davitt in 2017 in a bid to “free herself” from curses. Prince also changed his name in 1993 to an unpronounceable love symbol in retaliation to Warner Bros for not releasing his music.

In the following year, Sinéad changed her name yet again to Shuhada Davitt after announcing that she was now a Muslim in posts that showed her singing the Islamic call to prayer. “That was a big warning sign. Sinead is copying everything Prince did, and the concern is she’ll lose her life the same way,” an insider shared at the time.