Charles Kelley of Lady A is opening up about his journey to sobriety.
In the Friday, Nov. 15, episode of the Hulu docuseries, It’s All Country, Kelley, 43, opened up about quitting alcohol, after it started to impact his marriage to wife Cassie McConnell, as well as his work.
“Success is a double-edged sword, for sure. You know, once you know what it feels like, and once you’ve been out there, it’s a drug in itself,” Kelley said in the series. “There is a lot of doubt that can come in and there’s just a lot of, I think, keeping your ego in check. I had to come back from treatment.”
According to Kelley, Lady A had pushed back their Request Line Tour by a full year so that he could go to a rehabilitation facility in Utah.
“We were kind of talking to our team about, you know, ‘What do we say? Why are we canceling the tour?’ ” he recalled, before detailing that he and bandmates Hillary Scott and Dave Haywood wanted to be “more honest” about the situation at hand.
Charles Kelley and wife Cassie.
“Dave and Hillary were such good friends throughout this whole journey,” he said. “And thank God, I felt like I was given this second lease on my career and my marriage.”
The country singer previously revealed that McConnell, 41, with whom he shares one son, had made plans to meet with a divorce attorney before his stint in rehab.
“When he was in rehab and I went out there for family week, one of the first messages you receive is, ‘You’re gonna have to do just as much work here.’ And I remember being so mad,” McConnell said previously during an appearance on CBS Mornings. “Like, you did this. And now I have to do all of this work too? But … it affects every person in that family system. So I could’ve chosen not to do the work, but then I have to live with the way that I’ve been affected and unhealed. So whether Charles and I were in a marriage or not, whether I saw him again for the rest of my life, I still had to deal with what I had gone through.”
Lady A shared a statement on Instagram in August 2022 when they first announced the postponement of their tour.
“Being on the road with our fans is our greatest joy, so it was a hard but important decision to make,” the group wrote. “We are a band, but more importantly … we’re family. We’re proud to say that Charles has embarked on a journey to sobriety.”
Dave Haywood, Hillary Scott and Charles Kelley of Lady A.
Ed Rode/Getty
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Also during his appearance on It’s All Country, Kelley said getting sober is the “best decision I’ve ever made in my life.”
“I just think it’s such a common occurrence and we all struggle with it. The stage of career I’m at and the stage of life I’m in, I wanna be able to give something back, too, in a positive way, even if it’s just a little bit of encouragement,” he said.
If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, please contact the SAMHSA helpline at 1-800-662-HELP.
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