David Bowie’s daughter Lexi Jones pays a touching tribute to her late father on what would have been his 79th birthday

David Bowie’s daughter Lexi Jones has paid a touching tribute to her late father on what would have been his 79th birthday.

The rock star passed away following an 18-month battle with liver cancer at the age of 69.

His birthday comes just two days before the 10th anniversary of his death. 

Taking to Instagram on Thursday, the late singer’s only daughter Lexi, real name Alexandria Zahra Jones, shared a sweet throwback snap with her father.

In the snap, a young Lexi nestled into her father for a photo while holding a birthday cake. 

The singer, 25, captioned the post: ‘Da big 79 today. Happy birthday pops, miss ya!’

The post comes just months after Lexi revealed she has been diagnosed with autism, after a ‘long and exhausting journey’ and years of struggling to fit in.

The daughter of the late musical legend took to Instagram in August to candidly open up on the ‘validating’ diagnosis and how she’d spent her whole life trying to pretend to be ‘normal’.  

Lexi explained she’d spent thousands of dollars seeking professional help, before finally getting a formal diagnosis from an autism and ADHD specialist.

The artist first announced her diagnosis in June, admitting that learning she was autistic gave her ‘clarity and relief’, after spending years hiding it without realising, leaving her drained and alienated.

She took to her Instagram to write: ‘Autism does not have one look, one voice, or one way of showing up. It comes in many forms, and a lot of us learn to hide it without even realizing we are doing it. 

‘I was recently diagnosed as autistic, and it finally made sense of so much I have carried quietly my whole life.

‘It is very common for women and people socialized as female to be diagnosed later in life. We are often conditioned to mask, mirror, and internalize. That does not make it any less real.

‘This diagnosis does not change who I am, but it gives me language, clarity, and relief. I am sharing this because I know I am not the only one, and because stories like this deserve to be seen.’

Alongside, she posted a deeply personal essay entitled, The Quiet Effort: Neurodivergence through my lens, where she candidly opened up on how she’d ‘spent my whole life feeling like I was different’.

Lexi recalled growing up feeling ‘isolated’ and spent years mirroring those around her and ‘masking’ – referring to the conscious or unconscious effort by individuals to hide or suppress their natural autistic traits and behaviours to appear more neurotypical.

She wrote: ‘I never really felt like I belonged anywhere, and it ultimately left me exhausted from masking’.

Lexo – real name Alexandria Zahra Jones – confessed she had become good at ‘blending in’ but that it never came naturally to her and was something she had to work hard at ‘consciously constructing’.

She wrote: ‘It feels more like a performance I have built over time, not a reflection of how I truly think, feel, or function.’

She explained how she would get overwhelmed and ‘shut down or lash out’, while describing her lack of sense of self as a ‘sense of pain’ that ‘chips away at my confidence and sense of worth.’

 While she also confessed being worried that she appeared too high-functioning that she was ‘overplaying things for attention’ or because she was desperate to be different.

She said: ‘I’ve had a history of being misread and labeled as anxious, intense, depressed, or dramatic, but none of those labels ever explained the full picture.’

However, Lexi went on: ‘I am not trying to be seen as different. I have always just felt different, and I have spent so much of my time trying to figure out why.’

She revealed she had been through a ‘long and exhausting process’ and spent ‘thousands of dollars’ on trying to find the answer, so she could ‘start building a life that actually fits who I am.’ 

She described finally getting her autism diagnosis as ‘validating’, as it made sense of all the things she had been feeling her whole life.

She concluded the lengthy piece by stressing that while she’s still the same person, she is now able to feel ‘more self-compassion and less shame’ about the way she is and thinks.

Lexi finished: ‘It is not about fitting into a category or chasing a label. It is about being able to see myself clearly for the first time. And I wanted to share that.