How Lisa Marie Presley’s matching tattoo with her son Ben Keough helped her grieve

When Lisa Marie Presley’s son Benjamin Keough died by suicide in 2020 she started residing on borrowed time, Elvis Presley’s granddaughter Riley Keough advised Oprah Winfrey in an unique prime-time particular “An Oprah Particular: The Presleys — Elvis, Lisa Marie and Riley,” airing Tuesday on CBS.

“I simply could not think about a world the place she would make it with out him,” mentioned Keough as she recalled the ultimate years she shared along with her well-known mom, and the way she processed her brother’s loss of life, as she completed co-writing “From Right here to the Nice Unknown,” Lisa Marie’s posthumous memoir.

“She would say ‘I will die of a damaged coronary heart’ and I believe we felt that,” Keough advised Winfrey. 

Lisa Marie’s grief was so immense that she saved Ben’s coffin in her residence for about two months after his loss of life. She labored with a funeral house owner to make sure the physique was preserved — utilizing dry ice — till it was prepared for burial. 

“All people in the home was within the grieving course of,” mentioned Keough, including that Lisa Marie felt consolation when she sat by the physique.

Throughout the mourning interval, Lisa Marie referred to as in a tattoo artist to assist get her ink earlier than laying Ben to relaxation. She wished to have a tattoo like his on her hand — the identical place he had a tattoo.

“My mother was simply very a lot herself,” Keough mentioned. “She wasn’t a loopy girl.”

Keough recollects how Lisa Marie took the artist to Ben’s coffin to point out him the tattoo placement, guaranteeing that the position could be precisely proper. 

“He is like, okay, do you’ve got any images?” Keough remembers the tattoo artist asking. “And he or she was like ‘No, however I can present you.'”

Keough mentioned the tattoo artist was very skilled, studied the position, and created the significant tattoo for Lisa Marie.

The tattoo honoring their mother-son connection proved how shut the pair have been. In her memoir, Lisa Marie wrote about how a lot Ben resembled her father Elvis.

“Ben was similar to his grandfather, very, very, very, and in each approach. He even regarded like him. Ben was a lot like him, it scared me. I did not need to inform him as a result of I assumed it was an excessive amount of to placed on a child. We have been very shut. He’d inform me the whole lot. Ben and I had the identical relationship that my father and his mom had. It was a generational f-–ing cycle. Gladys liked my dad a lot that she drank herself to loss of life worrying about him. Ben did not stand a f-–ing probability,” Lisa Marie wrote. 

Stream Winfrey’s unique hourlong interview with Keough on Tuesday, Oct. 8, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on CBS. “An Oprah Particular: The Presleys — Elvis, Lisa Marie and Riley” will stream dwell on Paramount+ for “Paramount+ with Showtime” subscribers and will likely be accessible on demand the following day for “Paramount+ Necessities” subscribers.

In case you or somebody is in emotional misery or a suicidal disaster, you may attain the 988 Suicide & Disaster Lifeline by calling or texting 988. You too can chat with the 988 Suicide & Disaster Lifeline right here.

For extra details about psychological well being care sources and assist, The Nationwide Alliance on Psychological Sickness (NAMI) HelpLine may be reached Monday by means of Friday, 10 a.m.–10 p.m. ET, at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264) or e mail [email protected].