Julian Lennon, who inspired three Beatles songs, hopes to encourage fans to undergo heart checks after suffering a health scare.
The musician, 63, whose biggest hit was Too Late For Goodbyes, has been ‘diagnosed with coronary heart disease and [being] pre-diabetic’.
He advises online fans: ‘I urge you all to get checked out sooner rather than later. You never know what hidden health issues you may have.
‘I’ve managed to catch them early enough to be able to reverse some of the damage and will hopefully be able to live a healthy long life.’
In 2020, Julian – John Lennon’s son with his first wife, Cynthia – revealed he was left ‘shaking inside’ following an emergency operation to remove a cancerous growth from his head.
The singer had visited his dermatologist, who noticed a lump on his head which he had had all his life ‘looked and felt a little different’ and she urged him to have a biopsy.
Julian Lennon, who inspired three Beatles songs, hopes to encourage fans to undergo heart checks after suffering a health scare
The results showed that the mole was cancerous and Julian immediately went under the knife in Los Angeles to get it removed.
He wrote on Facebook: ‘She urged me to have a Biopsy 2 days ago, which I obliged… Only to learn, 24 hrs later, that it was malignant/cancerous, and that her recommendation was to get it removed immediately, which is what happened today…
‘Hopefully we managed to remove all that was cancerous, but the mole is being sent off again, for a further/deeper analysis, and I’ll have those results next week.’
The singer-songwriter and photographer, who was the inspiration behind Beatles classics Hey Jude, Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds and Good Night, said prior to finding the lump he had had one of the most ‘positive and productive weeks’ of his life after a ‘very trying year, if not 5 years’ since his mother Cynthia died.
‘I cannot tell you how I felt, from One moment of Joy, to the fear of feeling that I may be gone, at any given moment,’ he wrote.
‘I’m still shaking inside… But My Faith is Strong….’
Following the 48-hour ordeal, he has urged people to get checked twice a year. ‘Things can turn in a Day, as it did with Me…. Take care of Yourself, and urge those you love, to go for Check-Ups too….
‘Life is too Short… Don’t make it shorter, by being ignorant about Your Own health.’
Julian’s mother Cynthia died in April 2015 at her home in Spain after a ‘short but brave’ battle with cancer.
Cynthia met John Lennon at art school in Liverpool in 1957 and the couple married just before Beatlemania transformed her husband from a jobbing musician into one of the most famous men in the world.
Julian famously inspired three Beatles songs, among them the iconic Hey Jude, written by Paul McCartney following John Lennon’s divorce from his first wife Cynthia (pictured with John in 1968)
Julian’s half-brother Sean, also a musician, is John Lennon’s son with his second wife, the Japanese artist Yoko Ono (pictured together in 2021)
At the height of the Beatles’ early success, she was kept so far in the background that many of Lennon’s female fans were not even aware of her existence, and she stayed at home bringing up Julian while the Fab Four toured the world and topped the charts.
But the pair divorced in 1968 after Cynthia discovered her husband’s relationship with the Japanese artist Yoko Ono, the Beatles legend’s soon-to-be second wife and the mother of his youngest son, Sean.
The divorce prompted Paul McCartney to pen the Beatles’ classic Hey Jude to help Julian cope with his parents’ separation. He changed the name Julian to Jude in the song.
The line ‘take a sad song and make it better,’ is about the Lennons’ broken marriage and its impact on their son.
John was shot dead by crazed fan Mark Chapman outside his New York City apartment complex in 1980.
