Jelly Roll Makes Heartbreaking Announcement

Jelly Roll has filed for divorce from his wife, Bunnie XO, ending one of country music’s most closely watched marriages after more than nine years together.

The 41-year-old country star filed the paperwork May 18 in Williamson County, Tennessee, according to court records viewed by Fox News Digital.

Jelly Roll listed the couple’s date of separation as May 9 and cited irreconcilable differences.

The split appears to be moving quickly, with TMZ obtaining photos of a moving truck outside the former couple’s Tennessee home amid the divorce proceedings.

Sources told TMZ the breakup was a mutual decision and remains a private family matter.

Bunnie XO, whose real name is Alisa DeFord, met Jelly Roll in 2015 before he became one of country music’s biggest breakout stars.

The relationship turned romantic the following year, and the couple tied the knot in August 2016 during a whirlwind Las Vegas ceremony.

Bunnie, 46, became stepmother to Jelly Roll’s daughter, Bailee, and son, Noah.

She was previously a sex worker and left the industry in 2023, years after marrying the singer.

The divorce filing comes just months after Jelly Roll and Bunnie appeared affectionate together at the 2026 Grammy Awards in February.

The couple showed PDA on the red carpet and inside the venue, where Jelly Roll later gave Bunnie a shoutout after winning the Grammy for Best Contemporary Country Album.

Their public love story was built around loyalty, redemption and second chances, but the marriage had long been marked by serious ups and downs.

One week before their wedding, Jelly Roll welcomed a son with another woman.

Bunnie has been open about the early chaos in their relationship, including in her memoir, “Stripped Down: Unfiltered and Unapologetic.”

In the book and in interviews, the “Dumb Blonde” podcast host described a turbulent past, a difficult upbringing and painful moments that nearly ended the marriage before it became a public success story.

She previously said one breaking point came when she learned Jelly Roll’s ex-fling was waiting for him “in a hotel room down the street.”

“When I found out about it, I was devastated,” she told Fox News Digital in February. “I was hurt because I didn’t think he would be the one person to do that. I thought he was different. And at that moment, my heart was broken. But instead of getting mad at him, I asked myself, ‘Why do I keep attracting these kinds of men?’”

Bunnie said their marriage was never built like a traditional relationship from the start.

“I think a lot of people need to realize that coming into this marriage, we weren’t a traditional bride and groom,” she explained.

“I was a working girl, and he was an ex-drug dealer — a gangster-turned-struggling artist. There’s a different set of rules on the street than there are in what I’d call traditional marriages. If you’ve never lived that lifestyle, you’re not going to understand. But of course, cheating is wrong across the board — it doesn’t matter.”

In her memoir, Bunnie recalled the moment messages began coming in about Jelly Roll and the alleged ex-fling.

“Are you f—ing kidding me?” she wrote. “We had an agreement…. Folks started DM’ing me on social media, telling me that J was with his ex-fling. The pieces started to fit together, and it became easier to disconnect from him…. I went completely silent and didn’t reach out to J or answer any calls.”

She also connected that painful period to Jelly Roll’s 2018 album, “Waylon & Willie II.”

“Have you ever listened to those songs?” she wrote. “Go give it a listen, and you’ll clearly hear a man smack-dab in the middle of an affair, pouring his guilt into lyrics…. To this day, I still hate most of the songs on that album, and I can’t listen to it all the way through.”

Looking back, Bunnie said both she and Jelly Roll were carrying baggage when they entered the marriage.

Jelly Roll and Bunnie XO at The Grammy Awards

“It’s not so much what was going on in our marriage,” she said. “It was more of my husband had a hard time letting go of the past. I had a hard time letting go of the past. We also didn’t really think the relationship was going to work.

“I think a lot of it boiled down to self-worth on both parts. My husband didn’t think he’d ever meet a woman who really loved him for him and just wanted to see him succeed without some of them wanting to change him…. And I had brought so much baggage into the relationship.”

“I had come out of a really abusive relationship,” she reflected. “The first man I ever saw cheat was my father. So I just didn’t really believe in traditional marriage at the same time either. There were just so many factors of why things happened the way they did.”

Bunnie said the couple eventually tried therapy to save the marriage, but even that initially exploded into chaos.

“If I could just paint the scene for you, it’s a husband-and-wife marriage counseling couple,” Bunnie told Fox News Digital.

“We’re like, ‘OK, we’re going to come in here, we’re going to learn so much, we’re going to get the tools to have a real relationship.’ We were never taught on either side of our families how to love properly. And we’re like, ‘We’re going to go in here and do this.’ That’s why we got a guy and a girl, because nobody’s going to be able to side with the other person. It’s going to be an equal opportunity employment moment.”

“We went in there, and this poor couple had no idea what they had stepped into,” she continued. “It was stepping on a grenade. We were just screaming at each other. There was just so much anger, so much hurt, so much pain from both ends. We left that therapy session that day, and I was like, ‘This is it. We’re never going to be together again.’ And I think he felt the same way too.”

Despite that, Bunnie said they found their way back to each other and chose to grow up together.

“We ended up coming back together,” said Bunnie. “We were like, ‘I want to grow. I don’t want to be this person. I choose you. I’m going to become everything that you’ve ever wanted me to be.’”

Jelly Roll and wife Bunnie Xo broke up after nearly 10 years of marriage, with him filing for divorce in Tennessee. She shared in February were hoping to have twins via surrogate. https://t.co/8bIMJPHv6F pic.twitter.com/YyMqDaB5Pe

— E! News (@enews) June 16, 2026

“I’m going to be a wife, and he’s going to become everything I ever wanted him to be; a husband and a father to the kids,” she shared. “We just made that decision from then on to just be better humans and to break every generational curse that we had ever inherited. I was ready for a change. So was he. So we set out together to heal and grow together.”

In 2023, the couple renewed their vows at the same Las Vegas chapel where they were married.

At the time, Bunnie said their bond was rooted in choosing each other every day, even when marriage was difficult.

“We learned that marriage is not one-size-fits-all,” Bunnie reflected. “Each person and each relationship is completely different than the next person’s. But you do have to wake up and choose that person even on days that you don’t like them.”

She also said they had both changed dramatically during their years together.

“I’ve seen 10 different versions of my husband in 10 years, and he’s seen probably four different versions of me,” said Bunnie. “I’ve improved on things that I have wanted to improve personally, but I also think we just love each other for who we are — the good, the bad, the ugly.”

“We don’t judge each other,” she said. “There’s no judgment in this house. I know everything about my husband, and he knows everything about me. No matter how hard it gets, we face things head-on. We call it ‘getting into the foxhole.’ When it’s time, we hunker down and get through life — together.”

Now, that public devotion has ended in court.

Fox News Digital has reached out to representatives for Jelly Roll for comment.

The divorce marks a stunning turn for fans who followed the couple’s messy, emotional and often inspiring love story through years of struggle, reinvention and Jelly Roll’s rise to country superstardom.

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