Coming Out Country: From Hiding To Healing (ft. Ty Herndon) | Rooted Recovery Stories

What if telling the truth about who you are meant risking everything you’ve worked for?

In this deeply personal episode of Rooted Recovery Stories, country music icon, Ty Herndon, returns to reflect on the cost of hiding, the power of coming out, and the kind of healing that only comes when you stop performing and start living. Ty opens up about the weight of being one of the first openly gay artists in mainstream country music and what it took to finally choose authenticity over approval. From internalized shame to spiritual transformation, this conversation is a raw, redemptive look at reclaiming your voice and rewriting your story. He also shares the latest chapter of his career, including his upcoming single with LeAnn Rimes and a new album honoring 30 years of music, advocacy, and hard-won self-love.

This episode is about more than music, it's about survival, reinvention, and the freedom that comes from being fully seen.


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Episode Cast:

Patrick Custer - Host
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Facebook: (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  / patrickcuster  )

Ty Herndon - Guest
Website: https://www.tyherndon.com/
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Facebook: (  / tyherndonofficial  )

About Ty Herndon:
Ty Herndon has lived a life and career of extreme highs and lows and celebrates a critical milestone in country music as his record-breaking debut single “What Mattered Most” turns thirty in 2025. Between 1995 and 2002, Herndon charted 17 singles, including his three number ones and seventeen top 10 hits, such as “I Want My Goodbye Back,” “Loved Too Much,” “A Man Holding On,” and “Hands of a Working Man.” He topped the charts in 1996 with the single “Living in a Moment” and again in 1998 with “It Must Be Love.” Ty continued to break new ground throughout the next decade, releasing a Greatest Hits collection, as well as the albums "Right About Now," "Lies I Told Myself" and the Grammy-nominated "Journey On." In 2015 he became the first major male country music artist to come out as gay and released the critically acclaimed albums "House on Fire" and "Got It Covered" and launched the annual Concert For Love & Acceptance. Ty made a triumphant comeback beginning in 2020 with the release of “Orphans of God,” a duet with Kristin Chenoweth that peaked at number one on the iTunes charts. That was quickly followed by the release of JACOB and JACOB (Deluxe Edition) in 2022 and 2023 respectively, for the first time bringing his full journey from darkness to light and back again to his music. The album touched on highly personal themes ranging from addiction, recovery, and mental fitness to lost love, self-discovery and personal freedom. It spawned the country radio hits “Till You Get There” and “Dents on a Chevy,” a duet with Terri Clark that spent 7 weeks atop the independent country radio charts, becoming the number one independent country single of 2023. Grammy-nominated and Dove Award winning, Ty’s voice is stronger than ever, and he’s using it to make a difference. In 2020, he created the Foundation For Love & Acceptance to further his work on behalf of mental health, addiction and trauma recovery, and building a more inclusive country music community.

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Produced and Edited by "The Cast Collective" in Nashville, TN!
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