We said goodbye this week to my wonderful dad, and I wrote this for him.
Grief is the price we pay for love.
— Queen Elizabeth II
I wanted to write something that sat with me after the loss of my beautiful step-daughter when she was 18 and my husband just a few years later. Something that said the people we love don’t disappear when they go. They move into us. They live on, in quieter ways.
I’m sharing it here because I think it might find people who need it. If you’ve lost someone, whether a parent, a partner, a child or a friend, I hope something in these words feels close to your heart.
Nothing Is Really Ever Lost
Nothing is really ever lost.
The people we love don’t disappear,
they don’t simply become a memory.
They move into the way we see the world,
the way we think,
the way we carry on.
He is there in the small things,
in the habits you didn’t notice you learned,
in the words you hear yourself say,
and realise they came from him.
He is there in the strength you find
on the days you didn’t think you had any.
And in the moments you wish you could ask him something,
and somehow, you already know the answer.
Nothing is really ever lost.
Because love doesn’t go anywhere.
It changes shape,
it becomes quieter,
less visible…
but it stays.
It stays in us,
and carries us forward.
If you have lost someone, just remember they are around us in so many ways, just so much quieter.
Tamsin x
One response to “Nothing Is Really Ever Lost”
My sincerest condolences.