'Bigg Vinny' Hickerson Has Lived a Life of Comebacks — but 'Battleground' May Be His Biggest Yet (Exclusive)

'The Biggest Loser' alum says his latest song will "make you want to go better and harder at the things you're trying to do"

It’s official — "Bigg Vinny" Hickerson is living his best life.

But in the weeks following his 2011 stint as a contestant on Season 12 of NBC's The Biggest Loser, the Trailer Choir music maker found himself in a much different place, challenged with a reality he didn't want to face.

"I was in a marriage that just wasn't working out," remembers Hickerson, 40, during an interview with PEOPLE. "[Married life] wasn't going the way that I thought it would go. How do I get this person to love me when it really doesn't feel like she loves me anymore?"

Ultimately, after two and a half years of marriage, Hickerson and his first wife Lori Diaz divorced. "We ended up having differences in what we wanted in life," remembers Hickerson, who notably lost a total of 211 lbs. during his time on The Biggest Loser. "We're friends now, but at the time it was like, 'I've given up everything and I've lost the weight and I've done this and I've done that. I've tried everything in my power to be this great thing that I thought she wanted — and I just wasn't."

Related: 'Biggest Loser' Couple Gets Weight Loss Surgery After Gaining 368 Lbs. Since the Show

And it was in those dark days that he wrote his current single "Battleground." "It was if God was putting me in the right place at the right time and saying that I had to go through this to know what I truly needed in my life," says Hickerson of the song that now serves as his latest song. "But at the time, that was my battleground."

But unfortunately, it wasn’t the first one Bigg Vinny has found himself fighting.

"I was severely beaten as a kid," Hickerson says quietly. "I watched my mom put a gun to her head and pull the trigger. Luckily, she lived to tell about it, but going through those things led me to being in a dark place where I didn't know how to fill the emptiness inside my heart."

And that’s when his trouble with food began.

"I thought if I got bigger than my stepdad, he couldn't hurt me," Hickerson remembers. "If I got bigger than my stepdad, he couldn't hurt my mom anymore."

But soon, the man that would eventually be known as Bigg Vinny found himself at 500 lbs., laying in a hospital bed in danger of losing his leg to diabetes. "I was 27 years old, and they were saying I wasn’t going to make it to 30," he tells PEOPLE.

Related: 'Biggest Loser' Winners Hannah Curlee and Olivia Ward 12 Years Later: 'It's a Continued Journey'

And then The Biggest Loser called, and the rest is history. Through the years, Hickerson has fought to keep his weight in check, but it can sometimes feel like a never-ending battle.

"Food addiction never goes away," Hickerson says. "I have to fight every day of my life to not go back and be that 500-lb. guy that I used to be. I have to remind myself of my worth. Just because you might get better at the fight doesn't mean the fight goes away."

And it's that fight he tackles in the lyrics of "Battleground."

"This is a song that would make you want to get up, that would make you want to fight, that would make you want to go better and harder at the things you're trying to do," he says of 'Battleground," premiering exclusively with PEOPLE. The music video had him back at his old high school with fellow artists Jared Blake from Season 1 of The Voice and Jared Weeks of rock band Saving Abel.

"As many things as I've accomplished in life and I've been blessed to do, I don't think I've ever had that true feeling of team and camaraderie as I had with my buddies on that football field," says Hickerson, who is now happily married to Jenny Goforth Hickerson and a father of three. "But being a good husband when the examples weren’t there is a process. I’m learning as I go."

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Read the original article on People.