When Ozzy Osbourne took the stage in Birmingham earlier this month, it was more than a concert; it was a resurrection. Seated upon a winged, black throne like a returning king, the man who gave rock its heart of darkness looked out at the 42,000 souls gathered at Villa Park and gave them everything he had left. It was a majestic, defiant final act for a true icon.
“I don’t know what to say, man, I’ve been laid up for like six years,” he confessed, his voice thick with the emotion of the moment. “You have no idea how I feel – thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
Those words now hang in the air with a devastating finality. On Tuesday, just 17 days after that triumphant farewell, Ozzy Osbourne, the legendary frontman of Black Sabbath, passed away peacefully at the age of 76. The roaring silence he leaves behind is deafening.
Even more poignantly, the Daily Mail can reveal that his final performance was a gamble against immense pain and failing health. Those closest to him feared he might not survive the show itself. “He was in so much pain, he had some very bad days,” a heartbroken friend shared through tears. “He knew for a while that he was on borrowed time, really. He was so ill that, in that rock and roll tradition, he could have died on stage.”
Instead, he held on, passing away at Welders House, the sprawling Buckinghamshire estate he shared with his wife, Sharon. He was surrounded by four of his children—Louis, Aimee, Jack, and Kelly—in the home he had fought so hard to return to from Los Angeles.
A Soulmate’s Grief and Fears for the Future
While plans are being made for a funeral, a new and desperate concern is growing among friends and family—for his beloved wife, 72-year-old Sharon Osbourne. There is a genuine fear that losing Ozzy, the central pillar of her universe for over five decades, may be a blow from which she cannot recover.
Sharon’s own health has been a source of worry recently. After using the weight-loss drug Ozempic in 2023, she lost a significant amount of weight and has struggled to regain her strength, appearing visibly frail. For a woman who has battled colon cancer and lifelong struggles with her body image, the emotional devastation of Ozzy’s death could have a severe impact on her physical well-being.
A friend close to the family expressed the deep anxiety they all feel:
“Sharon is very, very fragile. She is so thin. She is not well. We are all terrified for her health at this point. This is the heaviest blow. Ozzy was her life. The whole point of her life was him. They were each other’s best friend. We don’t know what she will do or how she will cope.”
It is believed that Sharon is too frail to endure a large public service and may choose to bury Ozzy privately in the gardens of their 350-acre estate, creating a quiet place of remembrance away from the world’s gaze. It would be an intimate goodbye for a love story that was anything but quiet.
A Love Forged in Fire and Forgiveness
Their bond was one of rock and roll’s most enduring, and most turbulent, sagas. They met in 1970 when she was just 18, the daughter of Ozzy’s notoriously monstrous manager, Don Arden. They married in 1982, and Sharon quickly became the architect of his colossal solo career and the force behind their family’s groundbreaking reality show, The Osbournes.
Their life together was a storm of addiction, fame, and violence. In a now-infamous 1989 incident, a blackout-drunk Ozzy attempted to strangle Sharon, telling her, “We’ve come to a decision that you’ve got to die.” She survived, and he went to rehab. “These things happen,” she would later say with a shrug that barely concealed the trauma.
The turmoil continued for decades. They separated in 2016 after it was revealed Ozzy had been unfaithful with multiple women. The betrayal shattered Sharon, leading to an overdose attempt.
“He had women in different countries,” she revealed, explaining the depth of the pain. “Basically, if you’re a woman giving Ozzy either a back rub or a trolley of food, God help you.”
Yet, their connection was too powerful to be severed. They renewed their wedding vows in 2017, a testament to a bond that seemed to thrive in the very chaos that threatened to destroy it. Ozzy expressed profound regret for his actions. “I broke her heart,” he admitted. “I’m lucky she didn’t leave me.”
As they marked 40 years of marriage in 2022, Sharon’s words captured the totality of their union: “Over 52 years we have been friends, lovers, husband and wife, grandparents and soulmates. Always at each other’s side. I love you Ozzy.”
Last year, Ozzy himself described the inescapable nature of their love:
“Sharon is like my soulmate — sometimes I love her, sometimes I don’t love her, sometimes I’m angry with her, sometimes I’m crazy about her… But through it all, at the end of the day, I love her more than anything in the world. Put it this way: I couldn’t live without her. I don’t wanna live without her.”
Now, the terrible fear gripping all who know and love them is that Sharon feels exactly the same way.
