Bunnie XO recently released her memoir, Stripped Down: Unfiltered and Unapologetic, going fully unfiltered and sharing her life story from struggling in Las Vegas to being married to one of country music’s biggest stars, Jelly Roll. The story of her and Jelly Roll‘s relationship is heavily featured, and the singer admitted that parts of it were “rough” to read.
“It was rough at times just for me to read it,” Jelly Roll told PEOPLE. “You know what I mean? We went through a lot of pain and having to go through it together, but reading the whole book and seeing where it ended at is really touching.”
Bunnie XO and Jelly Roll met in Las Vegas in 2015, tying the knot one year later in a courthouse wedding. The couple will celebrate 10 years of marriage this year, but it hasn’t been without rough patches. That includes Jelly Roll having a 10-month affair, which Bunnie wrote about in her book. She also discussed challenges she faced in her life prior to meeting her husband including a difficult upbringing, hard drug use, domestic assault and sexual assault.
Though it wasn’t easy for him to relive those moments, Jelly Roll praised his wife for sharing her story. “I’m just proud of her for telling her story so unapologetically,” he said. “I mean, she talks about everything fearlessly, from domestic assault to sexual assault. I’m just proud of her. She’s so brave.”
Bunnie Xo appeared on TODAY to promote her book and revealed that her husband didn’t want to read the project while she was working on it so that he wouldn’t influence anything she might or might not include.
“He did not want to read it while I was writing it. He said, ‘I don’t want to influence the stories in your book.’ He said, ‘I want you to really tell your truth because I want it to be 100% authentically you,’” she said, adding that Jelly Roll was still “probably sifting through” her memoir. “I think he might’ve finished it last night, but I heard from somebody that they said that he had said that it was hard for him to hear it from my perspective,” she said. “And that’s sweet.”
Jelly Roll and Bunnie Xo have been open with fans about their journeys both separately and together, and both have emphasized the healing they’ve done over the past several years.
“We saved each other,” Bunnie said. “We chose to heal together. We choose to grow together. We are ever evolving. You guys have seen probably five different versions of us through this decade that we’ve been together, and we’re going to keep changing and we’re going to keep growing. But the main thing is, is that we are always leveling up and trying to be better humans.”
She also expressed her gratitude for the position she’s now in where she can use her own story to encourage others. “I just feel like my husband and I, we both preach second chances, and I just feel like I am a second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth chance,” the 46-year-old said. “And God has really given me, he gave me so many tests to turn into a testimony and my mess became my message.”
Stripped Down: Unfiltered and Unapologetic is available now.
