Carrie Underwood Then and Now

By Brittany Sample Last updated Sep 2, 2022

From growing up on a family farm in Oklahoma to conquering “American Idol,” to being one of the biggest performers in country music, Carrie Underwood has gone through a lot.

With classics like “Jesus, Take the Wheel” and “Before He Cheats,” Underwood soared to popularity after winning the TV singing competition in its fourth season and hasn’t looked back. She is without a doubt one of the most successful winners of the “American Idol” series, if not the most successful. Her star is just rising over the course of the years.

Due to her success, she has won various honors and distinctions, including being admitted into the Grand Ole Opry in 2008, the same year she started co-hosting the Country Music Awards with Brad Paisley. As she accepted her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2018 (per Billboard), she asked the question, “How is this my life?” to the audience.

In Oklahoma, Carrie Underwood Was Raised

Steve and Carole Underwood delivered Carrie Underwood into the world on March 10th, 1983 in Checotah, Oklahoma. Find Your Path: Honor Your Body, Fuel Your Soul, and Get Strong with the Fit52 Life,” a book by Underwood, claims that her hometown was small, full of family farms, wildlife, and, “most of all, decent people who look out for each other”.

In the book, Underwood writes that she and her friends were allowed to spend a lot of time outdoors looking for snakes and toads and “chasing each other across the pastures” throughout her childhood. Because her family didn’t have cable, Underwood spent a lot of time “roam[ing] the countryside,” unlike many other children.

She Changed to a Vegan

One of the most well-known vegans in the world is Carrie Underwood. She actually won the title of PETA’s sexiest vegetarian twice: in 2005 and 2007. Underwood, however, has been devoted to a plant-based diet since she was a teen back in Oklahoma, unlike the bulk of famous people.

Today, Underwood makes an effort to eat vegan the majority of the time. She prefers to know where her food comes from and occasionally eats eggs from her backyard-raised chickens (via Women’s Health). Despite stating that she “so much” wants to become a vegan, her hectic travel schedule makes it difficult (via Self).

She Majored in Broadcast Journalism at College

Carrie Underwood is most easily associated with her enormous success as a country singer. But before winning “American Idol,” Underwood wished she could be more like Dolly Parton than Diane Sawyer.

Although we all know what transpired next (Underwood won the competition), the singer still managed to earn a magna cum laude diploma from her school after NSU recognized her time on television as the necessary practical experience to earn her degree, even though she hasn’t needed it in her career since.

Given her experience on “American Idol,” she claimed to have had enough of television at the time, according to People. “Right there was my internship,” she exclaimed (per Taste of Country).

Along with 1,800 of her classmates, Underwood obtained her bachelor’s degree over a year after being named “American Idol winner. “‘s (via USA Today).

After American Idol, She Drastically Reduced Her Weight

Nearly as well-known for her shapely legs as she is for her beautiful voice is Carrie Underwood. She acknowledged to Women’s Health that she didn’t always place a high priority on her health and fitness, but that changed after she saw an internet message board that criticized her weight while she competed on “American Idol.”

She was aware that she shouldn’t give a damn what people thought, but she also understood that the high-carb diet she was following didn’t make her feel great. I let my detractors be my motivation because I knew I could do more for myself, she remarked.

You then begin to question, “How horrible did I look before?” “People, she said. “Then you start eating less,” she continued. “Well, I think I should keep going.”

The Performer Went on to Have Enormous Success

Carrie Underwood’s 2005 “American Idol” victory was just one of a slew of victories in her career. Her debut album, “Some Hearts,” reached the No. 2 position on the Billboard 200 in the same year that her breakthrough song, “Inside Your Heaven,” reached the top of the charts.

She won Best New Artist and Best Female Vocal Country Performance at the Grammy Awards in 2006 for “Jesus, Take The Wheel.”

Since then, she has bought more than 66 million albums worldwide, garnered seven RIAA platinum or multi-platinum albums, and had 28 No. 1 singles, according to her official website. She has also received more than 100 major music accolades, including seven Grammy Awards.

With Hockey Player Mike Fisher, She Found the Love of Her Life

After meeting and eventually marrying Canadian hockey player Mike Fisher, Carrie Underwood’s life undoubtedly changed. Fisher was referred to by Underwood as the only male she “never had to worry about.”

After dating for a year, the pair got engaged in December 2009, and they wed in July 2010 in front of 250 guests at the Ritz Carlton Reynolds Plantation in Georgia (via People). “We could not feel more grateful to have discovered one another and to have spent this day with the family and friends that mean so much to us,” they said in a statement to People.