In order to make it as a country singer, US Marine Corps veteran Stephen Cochran [ tickets ] has been through more challenges than most people endure in two lifetimes.

Cochran joined the Marines' light armored reconnaissance division and headed straight to Iraq. He returned safely, but wasn't so fortunate on his next overseas tour to Afghanistan. Cochran, the son of country music songwriter Steve Cochran, returned home with a severely broken back.

"I broke my back from my L1 to my L6," Cochran said during a phone interview with LiveDaily. "I was paralyzed from the waist down. It pretty much shattered my lumbars. They told me I'd never walk again. When I woke up in the hospital, they had told me the way my back was broke, it was pulling on my spine and I couldn't feel anything from the waist down."

After Cochran spent nine, wheelchair-bound months in a Navy hospital, his mother and the military began asking what it could do for Cochran.

"The only thing they could do is keep me on morphine," he said. "The way my lumbars were rubbing together, it was just excruciating pain. To be honest, I don't think the Naval hospital knew what to do with me."

Then he heard about kyphoplasty, a minimally invasive spinal surgery procedure used to treat painful, progressive vertebral compression fractures. During the procedure, bone cement is used to strengthen the vertebrae. He was transferred to Vanderbilt Medical Center, in his adopted hometown of Nashville, for the procedure.

"To find out the only surgeon in the nation that was doing that surgery was at Vanderbilt, was the first sign that I had been called back to country music," Cochran said. "Four days after the surgery, I had the first feeling in my legs that I had had in nine months. Six months after the surgery, they had me back up walking with the help of the walker. A year later, I was back in the studio cutting singles. A year and a half after surgery, we released my first single to country radio, 'Friday Night Fireside.'"

He said it was named one of CMT's top 50 videos of 2007.

"It was one of those things that definitely showed me if you can put your mind to anything you can accomplish anything," he said. "Sometimes it's just between you and God. Don't let people tell you what you can and can't do."

Cochran, who also scored a hit with "Thinkin' I'm Drinkin'," is recording a new album and plans to soon release the new single "Wal-Mart Flowers." He vows to play 300 shows in 2009; 90 over his 210 mark for 2008. Cochran is currently in Iraq and Afghanistan, this time to play for the troops. He was looking forward to the trip when he spoke with LiveDaily.

"I'm very excited about that," said Cochran, who said he learned the intense performing style by watching Garth Brooks. "I haven't been able to go overseas since I was injured. I really don't know what to expect. Things have changed so much over there since I've been over. I don't know emotionally what to think--especially about Afghanistan. I lost a lot of friends there.

"It's going to be another challenge and a great event, at the same time, to get through," he added. "As far as music goes, I am the only special operations combat vet to serve in these wars. I know Craig Morgan served over in Kosovo. I really don't have anyone to compare notes with. I don't have any guys that have served in combat, who went over there and played USOs, to sit down and talk to. I talked with Craig about his USO tours and he said, even with him not even being a vet from that area, it was real hard on him. I can just imagine it is going to be pretty emotional. It's something that I need to do, and wanted to do for a long time. I'm very blessed and lucky to have come to a point in my career where I can take some time off and head over and give back to these men and women who are giving so much to us."