Wynonna Judd is finally telling her story – even the parts that may be painful for her family to hear.
The country star revealed she and sister Ashley Judd aren’t speaking right now, explaining that the two are not “connected” at the moment and focusing on their separate lives.
“We’re taking a break, which all families can relate to,” she told People. “She’s doing her thing, and I’m doing mine.”
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The revelation comes as Wynonna prepares to release her deeply personal new album Oct. 2, a project that prompted her to confront the complicated relationship she shared with her late mother, Naomi Judd, long-held family secrets and the anger and forgiveness she has wrestled with over the years.
“I feel like this is the most honest and vulnerable I’ve ever been,” she told the outlet about writing “The Hard Truth.” “It’s there for everyone to hear. So there are some days I think, ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’ And then other days I think, ‘There comes a point in your life when you are ready to tell your testimony.’”
Wynonna co-wrote the album alongside her husband, Cactus Moser. The music producer encouraged her to be vulnerable.
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“I knew it was going to be cathartic,” he told the outlet.
Wynonna gained fame as one-half of the mother-daughter duo The Judds, whose close harmonies and roots-driven sound helped define country music in the 1980s. Between 1984 and 1991, they scored 20 Top 10 country hits, including 14 No. 1 singles, and won five Grammy Awards, nine CMA Awards and seven ACM Awards.
But behind The Judds’ remarkable success was a mother-daughter relationship Wynonna described as filled with both deep love and turmoil.
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“There was a tremendous amount of love there; a lot of drama but a lot of love as well. It was definitely a paradox,” she said.
Part of that complicated dynamic, Wynonna said, stemmed from the struggles her mother faced behind the scenes – and the secrets she felt compelled to keep. Naomi struggled with severe depression for years before her death by suicide in April 2022 at age 76.
“My mother had an illness, she had a disease. I kept the secret, and I was devastated by that,” Wynonna explained.
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Wynonna said Naomi’s death wasn’t what gave her the freedom to make such a personal album, insisting she would have told her story even if her mother were still alive.
“I think I would’ve been more determined,” she explained. “It’s my story, and it’s my feelings.”
Still, Wynonna acknowledged that hearing those feelings laid bare would likely have been difficult for her mother.
“I think it would be very painful for her. Very painful. But I also know that she knows me, that I’m so honest and so up-front.”
