Whatever Happened To Debbie Rowe

The name "Debbie Rowe" doesn't cause much of a stir today.
But in the early '90s, Rowe had her fifteen minutes of fame following the bombshell tabloid
revelation that she was pregnant by music icon Michael Jackson.
The bizarre nature of their relationship captivated the world for a time, but Rowe's profile has
since dropped significantly.
Who exactly is Debbie Rowe, anyway, and what's she doing now?
The offer
Rowe first met the "King of Pop" when she worked as a nursing assistant for a Beverly
Hills dermatologist.
Rowe revealed the details of their initial encounter during a 2003 interview:
"I said, 'You know what?
Nobody does what you do better, and nobody does what I do better.
Let's get this over with.'
And he laughed, and we just became friends.
It was just right away."
Rowe was a huge fan of Michael Jackson's music and of the man himself.
And it seems Jackson really valued Rowe's friendship, confiding in her when his marriage
to Lisa Marie Presley started to fail.
Rowe says Jackson was upset because he really wanted to be a dad, so she made him an offer:
"'Let me do this.
I want to do this.
You have been so good to me.
You are such a great friend.
Please let me do this.
You need to be a dad, and I want you to be.'"
The offer was confirmed by Presley, who told Playboy that she was aware of Rowe's desire
to have her ex-husband's children: "I knew Debbie Rowe was offering to do it for him
while we were married, according to him.
She was a nurse who had a crush on him and offered to have his babies."
The marriage
It was supposed to be simple: Rowe would carry Jackson's child and the superstar would be
somewhat of a single father.
But the plan was disrupted, thanks to a friend of Rowe's who secretly recorded their conversations
and sold the information to the tabloids.
The shocking revelation of Rowe's pregnancy caught the attention of Jackson's mother Katherine.
Katherine Jackson was strongly opposed to her grandchild being born out of wedlock.
To appease his conservative mother, Jackson agreed to marry Rowe, who was six months pregnant
with her son Michael Junior at the time, in an impromptu ceremony at an Australian hotel
in 1996.
"Michael Jackson is a married man again."
A friend at the time asked Rowe if she felt any "romantic" love for Jackson.
Rowe answered that "the kind of love I have with Michael is bigger, more important, than
that."
The scrutiny
The circumstances of Rowe's connection to Jackson made her tabloid fodder almost immediately.
The idea that Rowe would allow herself to be artificially impregnated by the increasingly
eccentric icon suggested to many that Rowe's ultimate goal was a hefty payday, something
she has repeatedly denied.
Six months after the birth of daughter Paris, Rowe agreed to a divorce and a multi-million
dollar settlement.
"We have new details from inside Michael Jackson's divorce papers, and what's going to happen
to the kids."
Although she insisted to the press that she and Michael "were fine" and that she did have
access to the children, she was later forced to admit during Jackson's child molestation
cases that she hadn't seen her two children in years.
What seemed to hurt Rowe more than any claims by the press was the reality that she couldn't
give Jackson what he wanted: "I had so many problems when I was pregnant with Paris.
After that I couldn't have any more children.
Michael was upset about that, he couldn't understand it.
He wanted more babies."
The aftermath
With her marriage to Michael Jackson over and no real connection to her children, Rowe
soon fell out of the spotlight.
Although she eventually moved on with her love life, Rowe didn't move as far away from
Jackson as one might anticipate.
In 2014, it was reported that Rowe had become engaged to Marc Schaffel, a good friend and
former manager of Jackson's who first met Schaffel when he was still employed by her
ex-husband.
The battle
In July 2016, Rowe revealed during an exclusive interview with Entertainment Tonight that
she had been diagnosed with breast cancer, telling ET, "I'm a fighter and always have
been."
By her side was daughter Paris Jackson, with whom Rowe reconnected following the teen's
2013 suicide attempt.
Rowe successfully completed her chemotherapy in January 2017.
Rowe says her daughter was there through the whole process:
"She's my rock.
She's amazing."
What's next
Michael Jackson, Junior, also known as "Prince," at one point updated reporters about her condition,
saying Rowe's relationship with her children seemed to have improved following her health
scare.
Now it seems she has an opportunity to begin a new relationship with her formerly estranged
children and move on with her life.
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Whatever Happened To Debbie Rowe

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