For many people, Hayley Erbert is best known as the talented dancer who became part of the Dancing with the Stars family and married fellow dancer Derek Hough. But her story is much broader than her television career. Erbert built a reputation through years of demanding dance training, touring and professional performances before becoming widely recognized as Hough’s partner both on and off the dance floor.
Her life changed dramatically in December 2023, when she experienced a life-threatening cranial hematoma caused by a burst blood vessel while she and Hough were on tour. She required emergency brain surgery and later underwent another procedure as part of her recovery. The experience temporarily took her away from dancing and forced the couple to rethink almost every part of their lives.
Today, Erbert is in a very different chapter. She has returned to performing, spoken openly about the emotional effects of her recovery, and became a mother to daughter Everley Capri in December 2025. In 2026, she has described herself as feeling strong and healthy while continuing to share her story with audiences.
Who Is Hayley Erbert?
Hayley Erbert is an American professional dancer and television personality born on October 11, 1994, in Topeka, Kansas. She began dancing when she was very young and eventually developed experience across multiple dance styles.
Her professional career became more visible when she competed on the 10th season of So You Think You Can Dance in 2013.
She later joined the Dancing with the Stars troupe, where she became familiar to viewers through performances and collaborations with the show’s professional dancers.
Although people sometimes refer to her as a “DWTS pro,” there is an important distinction: Erbert was a professional dancer and troupe member, but she was not one of the regular celebrity-partner professionals competing for the Mirrorball Trophy.
That distinction matters because her career developed largely through performance and choreography rather than through the traditional competitive-pro role.
Hayley Erbert’s Early Dance Career
Erbert’s relationship with dance began during childhood.
Starting young gave her years to develop the physical control, flexibility and performance skills required for professional dance. She eventually reached national attention through So You Think You Can Dance, where she competed as a teenager.
After that experience, she continued building her professional career.
Her work included performances with major entertainers such as:
- Pitbull
- Carrie Underwood
- Paula Abdul
She also participated in the Hough family’s Move Live on Tour production, which helped connect her professional path with Derek Hough.
This period is important because Erbert’s career was already established before her relationship with Hough became a major part of public interest.
How Hayley Erbert Met Derek Hough
Erbert and Derek Hough’s professional paths crossed through dance.
They worked together during the Hough family’s touring productions, and their relationship eventually developed beyond the stage. The couple began dating in 2015 but kept their relationship relatively private during the early years.
That privacy was deliberate.
Hough has explained that he wanted to keep the relationship between the two of them rather than allowing tabloids and public commentary to become part of their private life.
Their relationship eventually became public, and the couple married on August 26, 2023, in California.
Only a few months later, they faced the most difficult period of their relationship.
What Happened to Hayley Erbert?
In December 2023, while Erbert and Hough were on their Symphony of Dance tour in Washington, D.C., she became disoriented and was diagnosed with a cranial hematoma caused by a burst blood vessel.
The situation required emergency medical treatment.
Erbert underwent an emergency craniectomy, a serious procedure used in emergency situations to relieve pressure on the brain. She later underwent a cranioplasty to repair the cranial defect.
The experience was life-threatening and dramatically changed the couple’s plans.
They had been traveling and performing together, doing the work they loved. Suddenly, Erbert was in a hospital fighting to recover.
Why the Recovery Was So Difficult
The physical consequences were only one part of the challenge.
According to Hough, Erbert had to relearn basic physical abilities during her recovery, including walking and rebuilding her strength.
For a professional dancer, that is especially significant.
Dance depends on abilities many people take for granted:
- Balance
- Coordination
- Muscle control
- Spatial awareness
- Timing
- Strength
- Confidence in movement
When any of these abilities are affected, returning to professional performance can become an enormous challenge.
A less obvious insight: Erbert’s recovery was not simply about becoming “healthy enough” to dance. For someone whose career depends on precise movement, returning to the stage also meant rebuilding trust in her own body.
Hayley Erbert’s Return to Dancing
Erbert’s recovery eventually allowed her to return to performing.
She and Hough resumed their Symphony of Dance tour in April 2024 after she received medical clearance.
Then came one of the most emotional moments of her recovery.
In October 2024, Erbert returned to the Dancing with the Stars ballroom with Hough. They performed together to Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things (Acoustic).”
The significance went far beyond television entertainment.
Less than a year earlier, Erbert had been fighting for her life.
Now she was dancing again.
After the performance, she described the experience as one of the most challenging things she had ever experienced physically and mentally and expressed pride in how she and her body had come through it.
Did Hayley Erbert Fully Recover?
Her recovery has been substantial, but it is better to avoid describing any serious neurological recovery as if it were a simple before-and-after event.
In June 2026, Erbert told E! News that she was doing great and felt “really strong” and “really healthy.” She made those comments while attending the Tribeca Film Festival premiere connected to the couple’s documentary about her health journey.
That is the clearest recent public update on her overall health.
At the same time, recovery can have emotional effects even when someone feels physically strong.
Earlier in 2026, Erbert discussed experiencing PTSD-like reactions around headaches because her medical crisis initially began with a headache.
That detail offers an important perspective.
A person can be physically recovered while still carrying memories and fears from a traumatic medical experience.
Hayley Erbert and Motherhood
Erbert and Hough entered another major chapter in December 2025 when they welcomed their first child, daughter Everley Capri Hough. The baby was born on December 29, 2025.
The timing was particularly meaningful because the birth came roughly two years after Erbert’s life-threatening health crisis.
In announcing the pregnancy, Erbert reflected on how remarkable it felt to go from fighting for her life to creating new life.
Motherhood has brought a completely different kind of challenge.
In June 2026, she described herself as doing very well and spoke positively about her daughter, who was then five months old.
Hough has also spoken warmly about watching Erbert become a mother and about the couple adjusting to life with their baby.
How Motherhood Changed Her Perspective
One of the more interesting aspects of Erbert’s recent story is that motherhood came after a major confrontation with mortality.
That can change how a person thinks about time.
Before the medical crisis, professional dancers can spend enormous amounts of energy thinking about the next performance, the next tour or the next physical goal.
After a life-threatening experience, ordinary moments can take on different meaning.
For Erbert, becoming a mother appears to have added another layer to that perspective.
She has described the emotional experience of motherhood as complicated as well as joyful.
Another less obvious insight: recovery and parenthood are not necessarily separate chapters. For Erbert, they overlap. Learning to trust her body again and learning to care for a newborn both require patience, flexibility and acceptance that progress does not always happen in a straight line.
Hayley Erbert and the Documentary
Erbert and Hough’s experience has also been explored through a documentary connected to their Symphony of Dance story.
In 2026, the couple discussed the experience publicly in their first major television interviews since the health crisis, including conversations surrounding the documentary.
The documentary gives context to something that short celebrity headlines often cannot capture.
A health emergency is not one event.
It affects:
- The person experiencing it
- Their spouse or partner
- Their family
- Their work
- Their emotional health
- Their understanding of the future
That broader perspective is important when discussing Erbert’s story.
Hayley Erbert’s Relationship With Dance Today
Dance remains an important part of Erbert’s identity, but her relationship with it has naturally changed.
Before her health emergency, movement was her profession.
After the emergency, being able to move became part of her recovery.
That creates a powerful difference.
The same activity can have completely different meaning depending on where a person is in life.
Her 2024 return to the Dancing with the Stars ballroom was therefore not simply another performance. It represented the recovery of something that had previously seemed uncertain.
In 2026, Erbert continues to be connected to dance through her work and through the productions she shares with Hough.
What Makes Hayley Erbert’s Story Different?
There are plenty of celebrity recovery stories, but Erbert’s is unusual because her profession is so closely connected to physical ability.
A singer can potentially perform while seated.
An actor can sometimes work around physical limitations.
A professional dancer relies on the body itself as the primary instrument.
That makes her return particularly meaningful.
Her experience also demonstrates why recovery should not be measured only by whether someone returns to their old job.
Health recovery can involve:
- Regaining physical ability
- Rebuilding confidence
- Processing trauma
- Adjusting expectations
- Discovering new priorities
- Creating a different definition of success
For Erbert, motherhood has now become part of that new definition.
Common Questions About Hayley Erbert
Is Hayley Erbert still a professional dancer?
Yes. Erbert remains professionally connected to dance and has continued performing after her 2023 medical crisis. She returned to the Dancing with the Stars ballroom with Derek Hough in October 2024 and has remained involved in their dance-related work.
What happened to Hayley Erbert in 2023?
In December 2023, Erbert suffered a cranial hematoma caused by a burst blood vessel while on tour with Derek Hough. She required emergency craniectomy surgery and later underwent a cranioplasty. Her recovery included significant physical rehabilitation before she returned to dancing.
Is Hayley Erbert married to Derek Hough?
Yes. Hayley Erbert and Derek Hough married on August 26, 2023. They had been dating since 2015 before getting married.
Does Hayley Erbert have a child?
Yes. Erbert and Hough welcomed their first child, a daughter named Everley Capri Hough, on December 29, 2025. The couple announced the birth in January 2026.
How is Hayley Erbert doing now?
As of June 2026, Erbert has publicly said that she feels strong and healthy. She has also spoken about motherhood and her continued recovery after the serious health crisis she experienced in 2023.
Conclusion
Hayley Erbert’s story cannot be reduced to being Derek Hough’s wife or a former Dancing with the Stars dancer. She built her own professional career through years of training, competition and performance before facing a life-threatening medical emergency that changed her relationship with dance and with everyday life.
Her return to the ballroom in 2024 was an important milestone, but her story continued evolving. By 2025, she and Hough had become parents to Everley Capri, creating a new family chapter after an extraordinarily difficult period.
The latest public updates are encouraging: in June 2026, Erbert said she feels strong and healthy. Her experience also offers a broader lesson about recovery—getting physically better is only part of the process. Rebuilding confidence, adjusting to emotional changes and discovering what matters most can take just as much courage.
For Erbert, that journey has led from professional dance, through an unimaginable health crisis, and into a new life as a wife, mother and survivor who continues to find her way back to the things she loves.
