Maren Morris: Son Helped Me After Divorce and Coming Out (Exclusive)

Maren Morris is grateful to have had her 4-year-old son by her side as she experienced an emotional year.

Ahead of the release of her new EP Intermission, the musician, 34, spoke about her tight bond with her son Hayes Andrew, whom she shares with ex-husband Ryan Hurd. Morris finalized her divorce from Hurd in January, just five months before “The Middle” singer came out as bisexual in June.

With so many recent changes in Morris’s life, the proud mom says that Hayes has “definitely brought me through a lot of this year.”

“Whether he knows it or not,” she continues, “I doubt he does, but I just want to be a good mom to him.”

Being on the road for her RSVP Redux tour has only made their mother-son bond stronger, Morris explains.

“He loves being on the road, which has been so much fun this summer, having Hayes out. I don’t know, we feel like partners in crime a little bit, and we’re going to be on this bus journey for forever,” she shares. “It just makes me so happy when he’s out and the fact that he loves it out here so much.”

Morris also opens up about her recent divorce and how it’s affected Hayes, saying, “I feel like there’s so many emotions when you have a child with somebody and the relationship doesn’t pan out and you just have to put on a brave face and a consistent face for your baby.”

“I think he’s gone through a lot and there’s, I’m sure, a lot of confusion because he’s so little,” she says. “But also, I feel like Ryan and I have done a really great job at just being great parents for him.”

Elsewhere in the conversation, Morris talks about the inspiration behind her new songs, sharing that one track on the record — “Because, Of Course” — is a “love letter” to Hayes.

“I wrote it about him,” Morris confirmed.

“It’s obviously my promise to him: Every love like that, especially a mother’s should be unconditional, but I like that when people listen to the song, it could be taken as a romantic song, but I didn’t write it about that. It was just about love itself.”