Jewel: I'M A SURVIVOR

AFTER SURVIVING A HARROWING CHILDHOOD, THE SINGER WANTS TO HELP KIDS WHO DON'T HAVE A SUPPORT SYSTEM TO FIND THEIR WAY OUT.

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IT’S part of her lore. Before she got her big break, Jewel was living in her car. But as with many such legends, the truth is somewhat different. “You think of my origin story, right? The whole world knows I lived in my car — they think because I was fighting for my dream of music. That is an absolute misrepresentation of what happened,” the 48-year-old once said. This was no Cinderella story: The singer was homeless because she refused to sleep with a sexually aggressive boss. “He wouldn’t give me a paycheck and I couldn’t pay my rent and I started to live in my car,” she clarified. “And then my car got stolen and I was homeless because of that, because I wouldn’t bang a boss.”

Protecting herself was something the “You Were Meant for Me” singer had to learn the hard way. While she has sold more than 30 million albums worldwide, appeared in several movies and even won season 6 of The Masked Singer, Jewel Kilcher’s road to fame was rough. Her road to inner peace was even rougher. In a searing new interview, the mom of 10-year-old Kase (dad is ex