Wynonna Judd Says She Toured as a Way of Choosing Not to Let Mom Naomi’s Death ‘Define’ Her

Wynonna Judd is reflecting on touring as a way to cope with grief.

During a May 23 appearance on Talking in Circles with Clint Black, the Country Music Hall of Fame singer opens up about her mother Naomi Judd‘s death and how going on The Judds: The Final Tour helped her cope with the loss.

Black, 63, asked Wynonna, 60, about the tour she went on right after Naomi’s death. “Here’s the deal, y’all. We have to celebrate the past because it’s where we come from but not be defined by it,” she began.

“So I’m trying to go back and stop the car, read the map and see where I’m going because I’m making a record right now. But I’m also living in the past, I’m in the present, and singing in the future.”

Wynonna reiterated that the tour celebrated “just how far I’ve come.” “I got through it. I’m better, not bitter, for all the crap that’s happened to me. That’s the key.”

“I think you have to get to a place in your life where you realize you’re not a victim. And all this crap has happened to me with mom committing suicide last year I had a choice to make.”

“I could either let that define me or give me permission to show everybody and myself that I could do it even in spite of the hellish time period that I went through, that I could still sing. And so I went on tour because those fans bought the tickets and they were there for me.”

Wynonna concluded that she was not going to “stay home and complain.” “I’m going to go to work.”

Her Wynonna Judd: The Greatest Hits Tour kicks off on June 7 in Nashville before heading to dozens of other cities in North America before wrapping up in Ocean City, Md. in early October.

Naomi died in April 2022 by suicide after struggling with mental illness. She was 76.

“Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness. We are shattered. We are navigating profound grief and know that as we loved her, she was loved by her public,” a statement from Wynonna and her sister Ashley read. “We are in unknown territory.”

Wynonna spoke with PEOPLE in October 2022, months after Naomi died, about embarking on The Judds: The Final Tour, which was supposed to focus on the mother-daughter duo.

“This is my opportunity to step into a situation that I don’t know that I am ready to do what I’m about to do, but I think it’s going to heal me,” she told the publication.

“Am I going to go home and just get depressed and down, and stay stuck in that?” she said at the time. “I signed on for this tour because it’s like, ‘I gotta do something.'”