When Ed Sheeran announced he was leaving his beloved Suffolk home to live in America for the duration of his US tour, at the heart of his decision was ensuring he wouldn’t miss a bedtime story with his two young daughters.

For the singer, the very idea of being thousands of miles away from Lyra, six, and Jupiter, four, was unbearable, say friends.

So he set about relocating them, with his wife Cherry Seaborn, to Nashville, Tennessee, enabling him to travel across the continent performing to sold-out venues while racing back to them afterwards on a private jet.

The weekend dates for his shows were carefully choreographed, spaced a week apart to ensure he could carry out Daddy duties while performing in cities as widespread as Boston, Los Angeles and Atlanta. After years of enduring the pressures of relentless touring, it seemed the perfect solution.

Little did he know when he first hatched his plan, just how much he would need his wife and children. And never more so than Saturday night, when he arrived back at their rented mansion hours after breaking down on stage in Philadelphia when he shared his torment of the previous five days with fans.

In an emotional speech, he’d told the crowd how he’d been abandoned by friends and family after failing to back his support act singer Macklemore who used his slot to deliver pro-Palestine speeches.

‘I’m feeling all of my friends and family and people I know abandoned me,’ he said.

He added that he had made ‘mistakes’ in how he handled the fallout and wasn’t sure if the tour would continue.

‘Back then, the idea [of relocating the family] was simply that he would be able to see his kids and Cherry most days,’ says a source close to the singer. ‘Ed had no idea this would happen, but what a relief they are in the States because right now Cherry and the girls are the only things that put a smile on his face. It is his sanctuary and has been so much more valuable than either of them could ever have expected.

‘The Philadelphia gig was the hardest of his life and this is the biggest challenge he’s ever faced. But there’s one thing that kept him going – the thought that his lovely little family would be there when he got back to Nashville and he’d be back in the arms of those who love him.’

Friends of Sheeran, 35, have been deeply concerned for his wellbeing since last week when billionaire businessman Robert Kraft, a personal friend at whose 2022 wedding he performed, banned Macklemore from performing at his Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts.

Kraft, 85, who is Jewish, accused the US rapper of hate speech during two previous support slots, where he called for ‘Free Palestine’ on stage and made other comments and showed images of Gaza.

Macklemore performed a song dedicated to pro-Palestinian protesters, and referred to ‘genocide’ in Gaza, a description Israel rejects. He also said criticism of Israel was not intended as criticism of ‘my Jewish brothers and sisters’.

Macklemore was removed from the tour last Monday, sparking a further backlash that included Sheeran’s other support acts dropping out in protest. Since then, other celebrities have added their voices to the fray.

TV chef and former Great British Bake Off winner Nadiya Hussain has shared a video with her one million Instagram followers accusing Sheeran of shedding ‘white tears’ and making himself ‘the victim’ in the row. In the video British therapist Megan Cooper said: ‘If the tears of Palestinians and black, brown and indigenous communities carried as much gravity, genocide would not happen.’

Welsh singer Charlotte Church has also hit out, telling fans at a show in Cardiff on Sunday that he was putting money ahead of doing the ‘right thing’.

‘Whilst he has made millions and has an enormous following, he has an enormous platform to do real good in the world. He chose consumerism and capitalism over doing the right thing,’ Church said.

‘So we say the same thing to Ed Sheeran because f*** the fact [he says] that musicians shouldn’t be involved in politics. F*** that s***. Politics is life.’ She then added: ‘Ed Sheeran, we’re watching you,’ repeating the phrase with her band at least four times before leading the audience in chants of ‘Free Palestine’.

Friends of Sheeran were quick to hit back at both women, saying of Nadia: ‘Hasn’t she got anything better to do?’ and adding of Charlotte: ‘She’s just cross.’

But, make no mistake, the saga has left Sheeran ‘in bits’. One friend tells me: ‘It is something he will never get over. ‘Ed is a people-pleaser, he tries to keep politics out of his singing but this has hit him like a train.’

Although, I’m told, his parents Imogen and John have been ‘propping him up’ as has his brother Matt, a classically trained composer, Sheeran is said to be ‘absolutely furious’ that his estranged cousin Jethro has joined the online pile-on.

Writing under his artist handle Alonestar, the rapper from Bristol dubbed Sheeran a ‘bad human’ and said: ‘I’m ashamed of my cousin Ed. He’s a coward.’

It was Jethro, I understand, whom the singer was referring to when he cited being abandoned by his family in his onstage meltdown. ‘Jethro has been a very difficult issue in the family for quite some time and a bit of a thorn in Ed’s side,’ a source tells me.

‘He seems to throw stones at Ed whenever he gets the chance and has made all sorts of wild allegations over the years. The truth is he’s just jealous and disgruntled.’

The repercussions appear far from over yet.

Sheeran’s manager Stuart Camp has jetted out to the US to deal with the fallout, while there have been transatlantic Zoom calls between members of his team.

‘Ed has cried, he’s been angry, he’s been hurt, but more than anything he’s just hugely upset. He can’t believe he has found himself in this position and it feels as though he can’t do right whichever way he turns.

‘He’s been talking a lot to his team, his manager Stuart who he’s very close to and others who are there around him and trying to work out what to do. But it feels as though there just isn’t any solution to keep everyone happy.

‘He’s completely exhausted emotionally. Everyone involved is utterly drained. And every time he tries to make the situation better another celebrity comes out of the woodwork and criticises him. He feels a bit exploited and used by others who seem to be enjoying the publicity at his expense. Some of the comments have come as a real shock. He’s had it from both sides at once.’

So distraught is the star that I’m told he’s considering taking a long break from his music career. Friends tell me that all he wants to do is ‘stick on a baseball cap and pretend he’s not famous’ for as long as he possibly can.

He has previously taken himself off to far flung places – such as Japan and Antarctica (where he and Cherry conceived their first daughter, Lyra Antarctica) as well as backpacking across Australia and New Zealand. Friends say this crisis has deepened his resolve to do something similar again.

‘He has made a pattern of taking himself away for long periods during his career, especially since starting a family.

‘When he travels he often doesn’t have any contact with the rest of the world – he leaves it all behind him and goes away to places that are often quite remote and a million miles away from his daily stresses and the pressure of being famous.

‘He loves nothing more than to put on a baseball cap and go back to being normal Ed, with no showbiz entourage or anything. He likes to go totally off-grid – and he’s never needed it more.’

In the past week, several members of the music industry have got in touch with me to share their views on the crisis.

Some who have spent time with Sheeran and adore him are deeply upset for him. One told me: ‘It’s heartbreaking to hear him like this when none of it is his fault.’

Others, however, have been quick to describe it as a ‘PR disaster’. One senior music executive took the view that Sheeran should have cancelled the 26-date tour.

‘He was absolutely stupid if he thought he was going to get away unscathed with this. If I was advising him, I would have told him to cancel it.’

However sources close to Sheeran have been quick to explain that this was simply not feasible. I’m told that with around 150 people employed by the tour as crew, cancelling the remaining North American gigs would have cost Sheeran in the region of £30million because he would not have been covered by insurance.

A source says: ‘People don’t seem to understand what the reality of cancelling those gigs would have actually looked like and cost Ed personally. There was no definitive need to cancel the shows, so no insurance company is going to pick up the bill, and the bill for hosting them is huge.

‘On top of that there were about 750,000 tickets which would need to be reimbursed and all sorts of other upfront staging and transport costs. In the end a rough estimate would have meant Ed personally becoming liable for around £30million. Even someone as successful as him isn’t in a position to pull that sort of money out of nowhere.

‘The artists speaking out have no clue how many people are relying on Ed for their livelihoods and he really respects that – he understands this isn’t just about him.’

While Sheeran currently feels as if he is, as one friend says, ‘public enemy number one’, he has been touched by support from some of his long-term allies, including Elton John, to whom he speaks via video call on his iPad (Ed doesn’t own a phone) most days.

‘Ed has amazing friends in the business who totally get it. Nobody is closer to him than Elton John. They speak every single day via iPad, often video calls, just to chat and keep in touch. He’s a very valuable mentor.’

As for his long-standing friend Taylor Swift, her PR didn’t respond to repeated requests when I asked whether she had been in contact with her fellow singer.

A-list support aside, those in Sheeran’s camp know they are in for an arduous journey before they reach the end of the tour on December 11 in Mexico City.

This Friday, he will play at Robert Kraft’s Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, where there are likely to be huge protests.

Those close to the star fear the performance – at the arena which first banned Sheeran’s controversial support act – will only reignite the row. One said: ‘Ed is terrified of what will be that night.

‘But what will undoubtedly get him through will be the thought of Cherry and his little girls waiting for him when he gets home.’