Mariah Carey's older sister, Alison Carey, faced numerous challenges throughout her life but had the opportunity to see her children before she passed away on August 24, as confirmed by her friend and advocate.
David Baker, who had known Alison, 63, for nine years, shared with PEOPLE that she "had a tough life" before passing away at her home in Coxsackie, New York.
“We knew it was coming, but it’s still shocking,” Baker said. “She became ill very quickly, and within a month, she was gone.”
Baker had previously mentioned on X (formerly Twitter) on August 3 that Alison had entered hospice care. He also helped her find her final apartment in Coxsackie, New York, where she had lived for the past three years. There was a discussion about moving her to a nursing home before the move, but Baker stepped in to ensure she could live independently.
“She got her wish,” Baker noted. “She passed away in her own home.”
Alison was the mother of four children—three sons and a daughter. According to Baker, her children visited her about two to three weeks before her passing. Her daughter, who lives nearby, had been visiting her daily.
Regarding her relationship with her famous sister, Mariah Carey, Baker mentioned that Alison wasn’t sure when they had last seen each other, but it was either in 1994 or 2002. Their relationship had been complicated, as Mariah revealed in her memoir that, at least at the time, it was “emotionally and physically safer for me not to have any contact” with Alison or their brother, Morgan.
Morgan Carey expressed his sorrow, saying, "I'm praying for them and hope they are finally at peace. We were five, and now we are two."
Alison was also unaware that their mother, Patricia, died on the same day, just after Alison passed away shortly after midnight on August 24.
“Alison was a highly intelligent, very sensitive person,” Baker added.
Baker first met Alison in 2015 after she sustained a serious brain injury during a home invasion. At the time, she was living on Long Island, New York, and was hospitalized there but was eventually transferred upstate. During her physical rehabilitation, she suffered another setback with a brain hemorrhage.
At that point, a friend of her brother Morgan suggested reaching out to a patient advocacy group on Facebook, where Baker was a member, to find someone who could visit Alison in the Albany, New York area.
“When I saw the request, I knew I was the only person near Albany, so I thought, ‘I’ll take this on,’” Baker recalled. “I went to the hospital, and that’s where I first met Alison.”
Over the next nine years, Baker and Alison formed a close bond. “Hardly a day went by without us seeing each other or talking on the phone,” he said. “I saw someone who needed help and knew I could provide it. She often told me how grateful she was that I was there. More recently, before she became ill, she would call me if I left for an hour and ask, ‘When are you coming back?’ And then she’d call again because her short-term memory was affected by her brain injury.”
On Monday, August 26, PEOPLE confirmed that both Patricia Carey, Mariah and Alison's mother, and Alison Carey died on the same day over the weekend.
"My heart is broken that I lost my mother this past weekend. Tragically, in a turn of events, my sister also passed away on the same day," Mariah Carey, the Grammy-winning singer, 55, said in an exclusive statement to PEOPLE. "I feel blessed that I was able to spend the last week with my mom before she passed. I appreciate everyone’s love, support, and respect for my privacy during this impossible time."
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