Amy Grant Shares Husband Vince Gill's Inspiring Advice After Her Traumatic Brain Injury
Ahead of the release of her new album The Me That Remains, singer-songwriter Amy Grant, 65, is opening up about experiences with several back-to-back health issues including a traumatic brain injury, as well as her ongoing recovery to a new normal. In a new interview, she shares the advice her husband, country music singer-songwriter Vince Gill, 69, gave her on one of the darker days.
On NPR's Wild Card with Rachel Martin this week, Grant talks about the last six years in which she endured with several health issues. In 2020, of course, the pandemic affected everyone, but also that year, Grant's doctor discovered she had an undetected birth defect and needed open-heart surgery. She underwent the surgery in early 2021, and says she felt so much better.
But then in 2022, Grant suffered a bike accident, in which she lost consciousness for 10 minutes. The injury led to some memory loss and processing issues, as well as depression during her recovery. "I felt the limitations of my processing," she recalls.
She also had to undergo two subsequent surgeries as a result of that bike injury.
Grant spent months in quiet downtime, just writing a lot in order to try to recoup processing and improve her recall. "I had to be very patient with my body," she tells Rachel Martin. "Very patient with recovery."
Related: Vince Gill, 68, and Amy Grant, 65, Are Still Going Strong After 26 Years of Marriage
But something her husband Vince said helped put her situation into perspective. "In the fall of 2022, when my world was very quiet, I just remember saying to Vince, 'What if this is all I get back? What if this is it?'"
"[Vince] just said, ‘Amy, life happens to every one of us every day. A virtuoso musician could have a stroke and never be able to pick up their instrument again. All you do is you just take the hand you're dealt that day and live the life that you get'."
Two years and lots of patience and recovery time later, Grant says she was back to writing songs. The first song she wrote was the title track "The Me That Remains" for her forthcoming album.
And as if all that wasn't enough, in January 2023, Grant then had to get a cyst from her throat removed that required her to relearn singing.
Grant talks honestly about how hard all of this has been but says now, though, "Those things all went together to make me so glad to be alive."
Watch and listen to the full interview with Amy Grant on Wild Card with Rachel Martin:
On May 8, 2026, Amy Grant releases her first album of new original songs in 13 years, titled The Me That Remains. Pre-orders are currently available on her official store: shop.amygrant.com
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This story was originally published April 30, 2026 at 8:24 PM.