Lainey Wilson Says Her Dad Is ‘Not Supposed to Be Here,’ And She’s Not Exaggerating

Lainey Wilson was pretty candid with fans about a medical emergency that involved her father, but the full story reveals just how terrifying the incident was for her family.

Fans first got word that something was wrong in late July, when she pulled out of a show in Iowa for a family emergency. A week later she announced that she'd be returning to the road and playing to honor her father. Around that time, Lainey's sister, Janna, offered that a fungal infection caused by Diabetic Ketoacidosis was the root of it all. Medicines and surgery to remove dead tissue were said to have put Brian Wilson on the right path.

There was more, Wilson tells Taste of Country. In fact, there was much more. Days before talking to Taste of Country Nights, the "Heart Like a Truck" singer's father had finally returned home after spending several weeks in a rehab facility.

"He spent two months in a hospital from a fungal infection that completely took out the left side of his face," she shares.

"They had to remove his eye and they had to remove some bones in face. He had a stroke on top of all of that. He had nine surgeries in a month and a half. He’s not supposed to be here," Wilson says.

A song called "Those Boots (Deddy's Song)" from her upcoming Bell Bottom Country album (Oct. 28) looks to honor her father. She has played it for her father, and he told her he likes it, in his own cowboy-kind-of-way.

"He’s a man of few words," Wilson tells Evan Paul. " I’m talking like, the only way I knew that he liked a song of mine when I was little was if he was tapping his toe or not."

The toe was tapping during "Those Boots," “But then afterwards, he said, ‘That’s pretty dang good,'" she shares, smiling. Look for ToC's full interview with Wilson on Thursday.

Bell Bottom Country is the Louisiana native's second studio album, the follow-up to her CMA Awards-nominated Sayin' What I'm Thinkin' album. Wilson is the most-nominated artist at this year's CMAs, and when pressed to pick one award that would mean the most to her, she says it would probably be Song of the Year for "Things a Man Oughta Know."

On Nov. 13, Wilson will debut as a character named Abby on the Paramount Network's Yellowstone.