After Near-Fatal Blood Clot And Other Tragedies, Eric Church Says He Was Saved By His Music

After experiencing back-to-back tragedies, the country music star Eric Church is ready to talk about what got him through them.

The 46-year-old opened up about his near-fatal blood clot that required emergency surgery and months of recovery. After that happened, Church became depressed, coping with the 2017 mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas and mourning the death of his younger brother Brandon.

“I went through a period there — there was a lot of darkness in that period,” Church said during an interview with “CBS Mornings.”

“Eight months,” he added. “Pretty dark.” 

‘Something About It Just Kind of Broke Me’

In June of 2017, Church has an emergency surgery after a dangerous blood clot was discovered in his chest.

The singer told Rolling Stone in an interview that he went to the emergency room after he experienced tingling in his hands and swelling in his left arm. 

Church recounted the ordeal to CBS News, saying, “The doctor came in, and I said, ‘Bad news?’ and he said, ‘Yep, you have a massive blood clot? I said, ’Can it kill me?’ And the doctor said, ‘Today.”

“It was the first time, I think, in my life I had maybe evaluated my own mortality, one, but then a lot of other people’s mortality, too,'” Church said.

After the surgery, Church spent the rest of the summer in physical therapy and rehab.

Church got back to touring in September of 2017, but less than a month later, he would face another life-changing event. He headlined the first night of the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival in Las Vegas September 29.

A few days later, the country music festival became the site of the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history, when a gunman opened fire on the crowd from his room in an adjacent hotel.

Sixty people were killed and over 850 people were injured.

A grievous Church told CBS News, “I watched people that night hold up boots and sing at the top of their lungs, and then two days later, it was the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. I had a lot of fans that had stayed over for the weekend to see all the shows that got killed.”

“Something about it just kind of broke me. I think it was the sense of what music has been for me along with them, the safe space part of it,” he said of his fans. “I think shattering that shattered a part of me. It still is a tough thing.”

Too Much Tragedy

Less than a year later, Church’s younger brother Brandon died at the age of 36 due to the “consequences of chronic alcoholism.”

“I got through it like everything else I’ve got through in my life,” Church said in an interview. “I turned to the one thing I know I can do.”

“I wrote songs,” he finished.

It’s truly inspiring to see Church persevere through so many hardships in life. Please join us in saying a prayer for him as he continues to make the music that we all love!