Songfacts®:

• This is the second single from Rob Thomas' fourth studio album. In a 2020 Songfacts interview, the Matchbox Twenty frontman said of the tune: "That's a song about two people who are together and lean on each other for everything whenever there is a problem. But sometimes you can't count on that person the way you usually do. Either because sometimes the problem is the dynamic between the two of you but, also, sometimes it's just too big for anyone to do anything about it."
• During the COVID-19 outbreak, Thomas was one of the first artists to live stream music during the crisis on his "Social Distance Sessions." He sang this song during an appearance on ABC News.
• The singer's wife, Marisol, has battled an autoimmune disease for years, and Thomas has often felt helpless in easing her pain. He told iHeartRadio how the song was influenced by her struggle: "There's a song called 'Can't Help Me Now,' which is about how my wife was going through something really, really hard, and usually she's the one that gets me through when I'm going through something hard. And it's about finding these challenges that you reach and realizing that she can't be there to help you and so the song is called 'You Can't Help Me Now.' So there's little moments that pop up through the whole record that I can say on every one of those, 'oh this is because I was going through this and this was in this moment there.' They're all kind of personally tied in."
• This peaked at #16 on the US Adult Contemporary chart.