Jelly Roll and Bunnie Xo currently have full custody of his 16-year-old daughter Bailee, and she’s been living with the couple for the past eight years.

Most fans know that the couple had to fight to achieve full custody, but that’s just the beginning. Long beforehand, Jelly had to fight to see his daughter at all.

He opened up about that experience on a new episode of the SmartLess podcast, featuring actor hosts Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes. Jelly explained that after he got out of a stint in jail, when Bailee was about two years old, her mother Felicia Beckwith didn’t want him to have anything to do with their young daughter.

“Her mother, at the time — rightfully so because I was a f–king criminal — wouldn’t let me see her,” Jelly recounts in the podcast.

“So I had to go to court,” he continues. “I had to get supervised visits through the courtroom.”

Jelly says that he began with small, short visits with Bailee, gradually building on their relationship as he continued to earn the legal system’s trust.

“I had to keep going to court every six months,” he recounts, “Like, ‘Look, I’m continuing to prove I’m changing. I’m in college.'”

Pursuing music was a dream he first established rapping in jail, but at the time, he says it was on the back burner.

“Music, being famous, wasn’t even a thought then. I just wanted to be a good dad,” Jelly says. “I just wanted to focus on being the best father I could be.”

It wouldn’t be until years later that Jelly and Bunnie, realizing that Bailee was in an unsafe situation at her home with Beckwith, began working toward achieving custody of the young girl.

Jelly has previously said that Bunnie helped Jelly get custody of Bailee early on in their relationship, even bankrolling his legal fees and helping him secure a safe place to live.

Much like Jelly in his younger days, Beckwith has had issues with substance abuse, and served jail time on drug charges.

Read More: Jelly Roll’s Daughter Details Her Mother’s Dark Drug Relapse

The singer has occasionally spoken about Beckwith’s struggles. His song “She” was partially inspired by her, along with Jelly’s mother.

In 2020, Jelly celebrated Beckwith’s sobriety in a Facebook post. But in a 2024 appearance in Washington, D.C., where he testified to lawmakers about his experience with the episode epidemic, Jelly implied that Beckwith had relapsed.

“Every single day I have to wonder, me and my wife, if today will be the day I have to tell my daughter that her mother became a part of the national statistic,” he said during that speech.

In February 2025, Beckwith was arrested on felony drug charges in Tennessee.

These days, Bailee is thriving under Jelly and Bunnie’s care.

“Fast forward, that same little girl that was born when I was incarcerated is fixing to turn 17 years old,” the singer said on the SmartLess podcast. “She’s got one of the highest GPAs in her high school. She’s a dual enrollment kid, she’s going to college, me and my wife have had full custody of her for eight years. It’s awesome, dude.”