Losing a sibling is some people's worst nightmare. Having it be in the public eye, with people speculating that your family covered it up, adds a whole other layer of trauma. For Luke Bryan, this was his reality in 2007 when his sister Kelly Bryan Cheshire died suddenly at the age of 39. Nearly two decades later, the singer addressed the misinformation surrounding her passing.
© GettyOn Tuesday’s episode of All There Is with Anderson Cooper, the country star opened up about the heartbreaking and mysterious death of his sister. “I’ve never really explained what happened to my sister,” Luke began. “There’s some misinformation out there on the internet, and I think some people kind of wonder what happened and think that we’ve tried to cover it up.”
Kelly died suddenly in her home when she was doing laundry, and Luke explained that they attributed it to sudden death syndrome. According to Medical News Today, sudden death syndrome is described as the sudden and unexpected death from natural causes. "There’s a very, very small percentage of people that die for no reason in the world,” Luke said. "It was like, you know, somebody just turned the switch off on her. It was tragic beyond words.”
Luke revealed that the family decided to look deeper into her death after realizing there were “so many unanswered questions.” They also wanted to know whether there might be “a family history” or genetic factor that could affect Kelly’s three children: Jordan, Kris, and Tilden.
“She had a pretty severe, like, orbital bone injury,” he said. “So, whether she fainted or not, I think she may have fallen into the floor and kind of knocked herself out. My nephew was 3 at the time.”
Reflecting, he honored her legacy. “She really was everything in our lives,” Luke said. “She was a mother of three children, and she was, I mean, the best mother you could ever dream of. And we all leaned on her for so many things, and it’s hard to really wrap your brain around her being gone.”
© GettyHe also shared the overwhelming grief he felt at the funeral home. “I did not want to go to the funeral home and see my sister,” he said. “I was just really not processing this well.” But once he did, something unexpected happened. “It was like a pressure valve released,” he explained. “It was truly like she set me free in that room.”
Tragedy struck again seven years later when Kelly’s husband, Ben, died of a heart attack. Luke and his wife, Caroline, went on to adopt Kelly’s teenagers. His wife explained on Good Morning America in 2017, "We never thought twice about it. You know, it was never something that he and I had to sit down and talk about, ‘Should we take this on?’ We just did that."
Luke and his wife have dealt with more than one tragedy in their lives. In 2017, his infant niece Sadie Brett Boyer died after battling an undisclosed cardiac issue and other conditions, per Page Six. She was Caroline’s brother, Bo Boyer, and his wife, Ellen Boyer's daughter.
Bryan’s older brother, Chris, also died in a car accident at the age of 26 in 1996.
