Ashley Cooke navigates life with a gentle assistance from her beloved friends. While the ascendant country star has enjoyed a banner year since reaching the top of the charts with her first No. 1 hit, "Your Place," in June 2024, she has also been traversing an emotional rollercoaster with a slew of tough diagnoses for both herself and her family, admitting they've had a "crazy, crazy health year."
"My dad had cancer for the fifth time," she shares in an exclusive interview with E! News. "My mom had a heart attack. Both of my grandmothers passed away. My sister had issues with her thyroid that she's been sharing on social media too."
As a 28-year-old who has also weathered a tough breakup last year, Ashley has something quite literally weighing on her heart. "I was diagnosed with Brugada syndrome, which runs in my dad's side of the family," she continues. "The toughest part is that I'm still learning about it every day. I don't know as much as I'd like to know, because there really isn't a lot we can know."
Brugada syndrome, a rare disease that can cause an abnormal rhythm in the heart's lower chambers, preventing blood from being pumped to the brain, can lead to sudden cardiac death. According to the Cleveland Clinic, the cause is unknown but is most often passed down genetically. "It's the kind of syndrome that nothing really affects you until it does and it's fatal," Ashley explains. "A lot of people on my dad's side have unfortunately had a cardiac episode and they were gone out of nowhere."
The scariest part, she adds, is that "there's really nothing to do or not do about it. It's just something I'm living with." While it doesn't affect her day-to-day life, "it's just one of those things that I have, and I just know that could be something that takes me someday."
Despite the matter-of-fact nature of her diagnosis, Ashley feels remarkably good. Not only is she optimistic about living a long, happy, healthy life, but her place in the world is feeling pretty great at the moment.
As she wrapped up her tour with fellow country singer Parker McCollum and embarked on the What You Know About That Tour last month, opening for country mainstay Lee Brice, Ashley has performed with Joe Jonas, Ne-Yo, and Jelly Roll in the last year, in addition to releasing her new singles "Swear Words" and "Tin Foil Hat."
But amidst the mountaintops of success, Ashley still carries the weight of life's curveballs. So, whose shoulder does she lean on? "Normally, my family is my support system," she shares. "They're the ones I would go to talk to and lean on, and they still are very much so. But when they're the ones needing the support, it's tough." Prior to last year's breakup, her go-to was "the guy that I was in a relationship with," but she's since filled that place in her life.
During her opening act for Kane Brown's The High Road Tour this past Spring alongside Mitchell Tenpenny, she turned her working relationships into a makeshift family. "I really got to lean on those friends throughout that season," she says. "I vividly remember talking to Mitchell Tenpenny, who lost his dad to cancer a couple years back, and we talked about my dad's diagnosis and my grandma passing away and all this stuff. He really was a rock for me, just having great conversations with him."
"One of the beautiful things about your core group being shaken up is that it's almost like God tells you, 'Hey, you got other people in your life that are wonderful,'" she continues. "‘I put them in your life to rely on and lean on.'" Though Ashley confesses it's difficult for her to be vulnerable with her work colleagues, the lesson she learned by letting her guard down feels reminiscent of a country song. "That really taught me that we're all just humans," she explains. "We meet in professional senses, but at the end of the day, you connect through hardships and you connect through all of it. So, let them in."
Another well-known face she's welcomed into her circle is Luke Bryan, who offered some mentoring while they were touring in 2023. "He was saying that a lot of artists he's seen make the mistake of getting so glued to their set list and show that they miss the nuances of the crowds every night," she says. "The reason why [live music] is so special is because you're not just setting up a speaker and hitting play. You're engaging."
Luke encouraged Ashley to be prepared to play any song and "have a good time." "If there's somebody holding up a sign that talks about the fact that they lost their father to cancer last year, play 'Drink a Beer' instead of 'Country Girl (Shake [It for Me])'," she adds. "That's why Luke has won Entertainer of the Year so many times. He's a show that people die to go to because they feel like their presence in the room dictates the show." And Ashley has incorporated Luke’s advice, sharing, "Since then, I've tried a little more to write my setlist in pencil instead of pen."
