A COUNTRY STAR CONQUERS HIS PAIN

AFTER STRUGGLING WITH THREE DEBILITATING INJURIES AND DEPRESSION, THE SINGER SAYS, ‘I’M STRONGER THAN I’VE EVER BEEN’

- EILEEN FINAN

LONG RECOVERY "You start to believe 'This is my lot in life, to be someone who's sick or injured all the time," says the singer (left, in 2023, and right, in May) of his string of accidents.

When Old Dominion frontman Matthew Ramsey stepped onto the band’s rehearsal stage a few weeks ago for their upcoming 54-date world tour, he realized a familiar feeling was missing: fear. “The stage is large, there are multiple levels, and I have to cover a lot of ground,” he says. “But I don’t worry, ‘Is it going to hurt me to step down?’ I’m not afraid anymore.”

Pain was a near-constant companion for Ramsey after he suffered a series of injuries over the past seven years: torn cartilage in his hip in 2018 from leaping and jumping onstage; a broken rib and punctured lung in 2021 after falling from a 16-ft. ladder; a fractured pelvis in 2023 from rolling an ATV he was driving. As a performer, “I wasn't able to give people what I felt they deserved.” The physical struggles took a toll on his mental health. “It was like opening the door for all these negative thoughts,” he says. “I didn’t feel like a fun person to be around—I didn’t want to be around myself.” Despite fronting country music’s biggest band, with nine No.1 singles and three platinum albums to their name, “I felt very lost.”