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Cher may seem like the model of freedom, but the 67-year-old singer admits she struggled with her daughter Chastity's decision to become her son Chaz.

"Oh yes, I had a hard time," Cher told the U.K.'s Sunday Times about her 44-year-old son Chaz Bono's transition from female to male. " I didn't have a hard time in the beginning when Chaz came to see me and told me, 'This is what I want to do.' I said, 'Well, if you're miserable, then you've got to do it.'

"But then as it was starting to happen, you know, it's a strange change for a mother to go through," Cher added.

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The "Believe" singer recalled one especially difficult moment.

"I called him at home and he wasn't there but he'd forgotten to change his answer phone message. So Chastity answered and not Chaz. It was she," she told the paper. "I thought, 'Oh my God, I'm never going to hear that voice again.' I broke down. I found it hard and it was a huge shock."

"Now I don't think about it so much," Cher said, adding that she struggled with what pronouns to use at first.

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The "Moonstruck" star said that she and Bono discussed the sex change "on-and-off for years" before he finally made the decision to go through with it.

"He'd talk about doing it, then he would go off it," she said.

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"I remember saying: 'Chaz, this is going to be a nightmare,'" she told the Sunday Times. "I went into full protective mother mode. I was so negative about it because it really is the last frontier that people don't understand. It's hard for them to get it. But he was so brave."

"I'm just proud he's done this to help others going through the same ordeal," she said.