Country music star Kellie Pickler has returned. More than a year after her husband’s tragic passing, Pickler returned to the stage for the first time.
According to TMZ, Pickler graced the stage at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee to honor the late Patsy Cline. As the video shared by Music Mayhem Magazine revealed, people were thrilled to see Pickler walk on stage who had a big smile adorned on her face.
After addressing the crowd, Pickler admitted she would be lying if she didn’t say she was “incredible nervous.” But despite her nerves, Pickler sounded spectacular as she sang a song she and her late husband, Kyle Jacobs wrote together over a decade ago called “The Woman I Am.”
@musicmayhemmagazine.com #KelliePickler returned to the stage to honor late country music icon #PatsyCline with a special performance of “The Woman I Am,” a song she co-wrote with her late husband, Kyle Jacobs. @Kellie Pickler
♬ original sound – Music Mayhem
Pickler told the crowd the last time she was in the Ryman Auditorium she was with Jacobs “on a date night.” “I know he is with us here tonight.”
Jacobs tragically died by suicide on February 17, 2023.
According to the Nashville Police Department, Jacobs died by suicide inside the Tennessee home he shared with the singer. Reports, at the time, claimed Jacobs had shot himself in an upstairs room.
Roughly a year after his death, the singer made the decision to sell their Nashville home, where they lived together since becoming husband and wife in 2010, People reported.
An autopsy report confirmed Jacobs’ cause of death, showing that Jacobs didn’t have any drugs in his system at the time of his passing but did have a history of “pseudoseizures, gastrointestinal bleeding, elevated liver enzymes, and chronic alcohol use.”
According to the National Institutes for Health, “pseudoseizure is an older term for events that appear to be epileptic seizures but, in fact, do not represent the manifestation of abnormal excessive synchronous cortical activity, which defines epileptic seizures. They are not a variation of epilepsy but are of psychiatric origin.”
Tragically, Pickler was also inside the home at the time of the suicide. Police told TMZ that she was asleep somewhere on the first floor.
When Pickler awoke from her nap, she couldn’t find Jacobs and began looking for him. She called 911 when she was unable to open the door to the room Jacobs was ultimately found in.
Jacobs was just 49 years old.
Jacobs is a known songwriter who has worked with several of country music’s greats, TMZ reports. Some of those greats included Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, Darius Rucker, and Kelly Clarkson.
Just two days before his death, Jacobs took to Instagram to celebrate a career win after a song he worked on with Brice Lee went platinum
“Platinum?! SWEEEET!!! An amazing crew of incredibly talented peeps put this one together…Deeply honored to be a creative part of it…Thank you Jesus!!!”
Pickler and Jacobs did not share any children.