Billy Ray Cyrus Recalls Near-Death Health Scare: ‘I Had A Miracle’

Published: June 12, 2026

By India McCarty

Billy Ray Cyrus opened up about the “miracle” he experienced after a near-fatal bout of sepsis.

“I got really sick and almost died,” he told PEOPLE. “My body was blowing up and there was a toxicity of some type of whatever. And if it had erupted, I would’ve died. [At] the last moment, I had a prayer answered.”

Cyrus shared that he had a “prayer rock” where he would kneel “every morning, every day, every sunset, every night” in prayer.

“I’d go put my knee [on the rock] and I was like, ‘God, please, I need a miracle,’” he said. “Lo and behold, they were going to do one last surgery. I got to the hospital. They said, ‘Mr. Cyrus, it’s gone.’ Healed. I had a miracle.”

The country singer also opened up about another hard time in his life. Cyrus was diagnosed with vocal paralysis in 2024 and was unsure he would ever be able to sing again. He was encouraged to push through his issues and overcome them with the help of two of his children.

“Noah’s got that one song, ‘Don’t Put It All on Me,’ that honestly saved my life,” he said, referring to his daughter’s 2025 track where she sings, “Some days, we might fall apart // But we’re never broken.”

What made this song even more special? Cyrus’ son Braison wrote the song along with Noah.

Braison’s son Bear, 5, also helped Cyrus keep going.

“In this very broken moment of my life, my little grandson Bear looked at me and said, ‘Try again,’” Cyrus recalled. “And up until that moment, he had never spoken to me at all. I wasn’t even sure if he knew my name. In that moment I thought, ‘He’s telling you something.’ Is it about love? Music? Somehow, I got to try again at both. So I’m learning to try again.”

Now, Cyrus is preparing for the release of The Hill, his first album in 14 years.

View this post on Instagram

“It’s a studio album verbatim of going in old school with a band and sitting on a floor in a good studio and cutting them track by track as you are making an album creatively,” he told Greatest Hits Radio. I’m pretty proud at this moment…It’s been remarkable at this point…I don’t know of a moment in my life where there was so much positive synchronicity in a world of chaos.”

The Hill debuts June 16.

Questions or comments? Please write to us here.