Country star Jason Aldean was performing when a gunman began firing on the crowd from inside Mandalay Bay. Now, Aldean is opening up about how he's been coping since the tragedy of Oct. 1, 2017.
"I think you go through a lot of different emotions of being thankful that none of your family and friends was injured. And then you feel guilty," said Aldean. "Those people are there to see your show so that's awful."
Since that dreadful night in October, Aldean has struggled with the complexity of his feelings about surviving the country's deadliest mass shooting in modern history.
"And then you start doing that thing, like, 'Man, did that really happen. Did that really happen to us?' It seems so crazy. Like how could that even be a thing?"
Aldean said his wife and crew were a great comfort to him, but it was visiting the injured in the hospital and the birth of his son that put things in perspective.
"That helped. Going back to the hospital, going back to Vegas and seeing those people. Seeing some of the strength they were having," said Aldean. " People laid up in the hospital and smiling and laughing and just being glad they were alive."
His son was born exactly two months after the Las Vegas shooting.
"Really to me, he just gave me something else to focus on. Something else to think about on a daily basis," he said. "Something else to keep my mind occupied where I wasn't just reliving it over, over and over."
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Aldean has new music coming out Friday and is up for Entertainer of the Year for the third year in a row at the Academy of Country Music Awards. The awards are being held in Las Vegas at the MGM Grand on April 15.
