I will become the love I didn’t receive

I will become the love I didn’t receive… not as a child, because I did feel it then, but as a man. Everything changed when I came out at 19. I’m from Portugal, I’ve been in London for six years now, and if I don’t call my mother, she doesn’t call me. I know I’m her son… but she’s still my mother, and sometimes, all a son needs is to hear “Are you okay?” that silence hurts more than anything… You learn to live with it…you grow around the pain, you become stronger, kinder… better, but the truth remains: every man needs his mother… Thank you

Written by - Anonymous

The bench

Remember that bench we used to sit at? The one overlooking the street, with the massive angel wings behind us? We must’ve looked like weirdos to the people walking by but in that moment.. with you.. nothing else mattered to me, I was lost by your eyes.. the way you’d look straight into me I felt noticed, I felt loved.

Now I go there alone and for a while it brought me comfort, but now it hurts to even think about, I miss you, I try to tell myself I don’t and that with time I’ll be okay but how long until I do? Months have passed and my hands still begin to shake when I hear your name.. I wish I could forget that bench but that bench is the closest I’ll ever get to you.

Written by - Anonymous

the most important person who was meant to see me grow

My mother passed last year on Jan 21st due to stage 4 brain cancer , I was 16 at the time. I feel awful for not spending more time with her while we could, I didn’t think the sickness would result in her passing. She was the strongest woman I ever knew and fought so hard until her last breath.

The coldness of her body on the morning of her death will never leave my brain, it’s like my fingertips can feel the cold skin while picturing her. I honestly don’t know what to do going forward, even though it has been over a year now. My brain still hasn’t processed fully that she’s dead and I keep needing to remind myself that.

I find myself going back to our messages and rereading the funny things she would send me, and deep down I really should’ve put more effort in. I took it for granted and it’ll be my biggest regret in life.

I’ve become so numb to everything that I’m not scared of anything happening to me, since my biggest fear already happened. I don’t have any friends that can relate with me , apart from my older sister that’s been coping with the grief better than I have.

I feel emotionless and alone very often, even in loud and busy places. I dont feel the need to do anything important anymore and have no sense of urgency. The past 4 years have all been a blur and I cannot remember anything before that , which is really scary. Grief memory loss is no joke and is terrifying me a lot.

I picture my mother as the woman she used to be before cancer took over, and I think that’s the only way my brain can see her. I hope to get her handwriting tattooed on me one day. I love you always Mama

Written by - Anonymous

Will anyone ever know me?

Ive always known love is the most divine thing. All my life, all I ever wanted was to be loved and known. Because of that I always gave everything I ever had in love. At 20 I met a man who I married soon after, and I gave my entire being to him. For 12 years, I gave him everything I had. Even my partners before that, I loved them as much as I could, but every one has always ended up hurting me. My love has never been enough, not even when I gave everything I had. I’ve never been good enough, or loved back like I have given. Never been understood, never been seen, not really. When my husband’s veil lifted last year, my world went dark. I didn’t ache for the love I gave or the hurt he caused, I ached for never being able to be loved back despite giving everything I had and becoming a shell of who I was. I ached for the girl I used to be before being hurt over and over till I could barely feel anymore. When it ended I felt it all in one go. Sometimes I feel so alone. Like, no one out there even knows who I am. Like no one even cares to find out. And I’m so tired that I don’t even want that anymore. Because that expectation that someone will, has cost me my soul. Sometimes I feel so tired, that I don’t even want to live anymore. There are days when I don’t see the point in anything. Not because I don’t love my life, or that I’m not grateful for everything I do have, because I am. Just because I’ve been tired of not being seen for my soul. I’m tired of hoping someone will, because no one’s even come close. Sometimes I think, maybe it’s just me. Maybe I’m just not meant to be seen, or loved the way I’ve always yearned for. Maybe I’m just stupid to think I’ll ever be.

Written by - Anonymous

Grief is the love I never got to share

I haven’t yet learned to live with grief and hope to one day be able to hold it within me like a friend rather than a enemy.
I grieve the loss of a stable family and a home that felt emotionally safe. But one thing that was a safe place was my grandad. I lost him a few years back I gave him cpr and tried to save him but I couldn’t there’s a gentle comfort in someone you love passing around everyone they loved but that guilt still is there of could I have saved him.
I lost my brother a year later.
I lost and grieve many pieces of my heart I have to romantic interests and friends who couldn’t hold it gently. But I’ll never regret giving love.
Anyone who’s reading this I’ve learnt from my grief to always love more alway call your loved once take the time to ask them about their life as I wish I did with my grandad and Brother. Tell them you love them as much as you can.
Grief is all the love we never got to give so I give all the love I can.

Written by - Anonymous

The Oldest’s Burden

I learned early
that love is something you anticipate.

Notice before being told.
Adjust before it becomes a problem.
Apologise for needs you never voiced.

Confusion is treated like defiance.
Asking questions feels like failure.
Silence becomes the safest language.

When I am tired, I am called selfish.
When I am quiet, I am called distant.
When I change, I am told I am no longer myself.

No one asks
what changed me.

I am expected to remember
what everyone needs,
when everyone is fragile,
how to keep the room calm.

There is no room here
for my exhaustion.
Only function.
Only usefulness.

When I falter,
love tightens.
Voices sharpen.
Intent is questioned.

I grieve the version of me
who did not rehearse every sentence,
who did not brace for impact
before speaking.

I grieve how love becomes conditional
the moment I stop performing it correctly.

Everyone wants a sister.
A daughter.
A familiar shape they recognise.

No one wants the cost.

So I remain —
not held,
not understood,
just present enough to be needed.

The oldest learns to survive by becoming invisible. And each day, something in her dies unnoticed.

Written by - Anonymous

Hudson

Last year me and my partner lost our son. Are life was already going down hill and that tiped it over the edge for me and I fell into addiction. Shortly after we lost our son we ended up homeless for a short while. We are now rebuilding our lives in a new home but not a day goes by that I dont think about my boy. I am not religious but I do hope once I pass I will get to spend some time with him. Some days I wish to go and join him early but I know that I must keep going for my partner.

Written by - Anonymous

Death of a parent at a young age

Losing someone at any age changes your life forever. However, I lost my mum six months ago — me being 23, and she was 43. She suffered with severe mental health conditions, including psychosis and BPD. Being her primary care giver while working was incredibly hard.

My mum often self-medicated with weed and alcohol, sometimes not eating or drinking for days. One day she went to A&E for a mental health assessment and suddenly passed away in the seating area for the waiting room

As her next of kin, everything fell on me — planning her funeral and dealing with endless paperwork — all at 23 years old. These are things no one ever teaches you in school.

One thing I’ve found while dealing with the passing of my mum is just how deeply grief can change you. And how fast people forget that your grieving… She was the only real adult figure in my life — the only person who showed me even an ounce of love growing up. I had never experienced grief before, so losing her left me feeling completely lost and empty.
I constantly think about how she will never see the milestones in my life — me getting married, having children. Everything I do now is without her, and in many ways.

But one thing I would say to anyone struggling the way I am now is this: you are not alone….I believe everything happens for a reason. And while I am deeply sad, I also believe that I had to lose her in order to find myself again.

Written by - Anonymous

I remain

You asked how my son was,
and meant it.
I know you did.
Your voice softened there,
as if care had learned a doorway
and paused in it.

You noticed me.
That was never the question.
You looked when another man leaned close,
your eyes finding mine
before you could stop them—
a reflex,
a memory of belonging.

I mattered enough
to unsettle you.
Not enough to stay.

You liked me in flashes,
in moments that didn’t ask much of you—
warmth without weight,
desire without reckoning.
But when I asked for truth,
you bristled,
as if honesty were an accusation
instead of a bridge.

You spoke carelessly then.
About my life.
About my bed.
Words that landed sharp,
small humiliations disguised as facts.
That’s when I learned
the difference between feeling care
and being careful with someone.

You had islands of kindness,
but no map to stay.
No way to hold what you stirred.
So you withdrew,
and called the ache a flaw in me.

Still—
you were not untouched.
People don’t fracture
around what doesn’t reach them.
They don’t defend, deflect, perform,
or disappear
unless something has entered the room.

I grieve what never formed,
not what failed.
The version of you who might have spoken gently.
The future that required more courage
than you could give.

I was real.
You felt that.
And I am done asking it to mean more
than it did.

What matters now
is that I remain—
whole, unashamed,
no longer arranging myself
around someone else’s limits.

Written by - Anonymous

Loving you in silence

My childhood sweetheart, it is a shame you never knew my value and it is a shame I never had the courage to go for love. Right people wrong time? Maybe. But I am reminded everyday, everywhere, even in your songs whilst you are locked away what we could have been. You now describe it as an epiphany, and 20 years later my feelings are still fresh as if I met you today. Don’t worry, I will keep you alive in my heart and keep meeting you in my dreams. My other half

Written by - Anonymous

Poignant Reminder

My wife Mo passed away from a brain tumour before we had a chance to do more exploring like we wanted to after her diagnosis. I spent almost two years, living aimlessly in a loop in our Shoreditch flat until the landlord eventually cancelled the lease.

I took that as motivation to finally embark on a trip through Europe as a digital nomad and figure out a new environment to live life more fully again like Mo and I would have done together.

Days before the start of this new adventure, I find 'I had to lose you to find myself again' written on the pavement, as a reminder that I'm on the right path.

Written by - Anonymous

Surviving Cancer While My Daughter Was Being Alienated by My Ex

You will write your own song.
I don't mean to interfere.
Yet there's something to be said
that some may like to hear.
You're the shell that is admired.
You're the souvenir.
I was one of those shells.
Life swept that away.
The world has many broken shells.
It happens every day.
Families torn, people mourn, even strong ties sometimes fray.
The broken shells that are here;
no longer perfect ones.
We won't be taken home,
once vacation's done.
Yet we will keep on churning,
where the ocean meets the land.
When you see us again, we will be the sand.
We all can't be the shell that is admired everyday.
Yet He makes us the sand that let you
walk the beach that day.
So when spraying off your feet
after walking sandy paths,
please remember it's the broken shells
that make children run and laugh.

- Stacy G.

Being pushed to be here

My friend passed away when we were just 15, only a few months after we celebrated her a year cancer free. It was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do, all stages of grief at such a young age, feeling like I could’ve done more as a friend when she was still around and doubting everything I had ever done for her knowing it was never enough. I’m now 18 and feel like I’ve lived 1000 lives since then, back then we had a big friend group and now I don’t talk to any of them, we all went out seperate ways going into uni and most of them are successful but I feel like I’m the only one still grieving her and wishing she was still here and able to do this whole weird uni experience with me but I feel her with me, almost all of the time. I don’t live in London but came here for two weeks for an incredible opportunity that only she would’ve been able to put into my lap and then I came across one of your signs and I couldn’t Thankyou enough for that. I’m a very superstitious person so even tho it was your workings I am very convinced it was her telling me that this is where I need to be and she will be here no matter what and it’s exactly what I’ve needed after everything, so I thank you.

Written by - Anonymous

Tanner

I spend my days hiding my feelings of loss and anger so my family doesn’t see it. I don’t want to cause them to have a rough day. I have no one to talk to. I cannot find a way to let go of my anger or say goodbye to Tanner.

He was the son I never had and the last male in our family line. When I’m alone at home I sing every sad song on my LostBoy playlist because I’m afraid if I don’t feel the pain anymore I won’t be capable of feeling anything. So I rip open that wound over and over again. I miss him beyond words

Written by - Anonymous

Grief. It’s a lesson.

Grief… What a lesson it is. Be reckless in Love and you’ll crash; my grief is for a stillborn future, for a kingdom I built in my soul whose queen, I discovered, was still in love with a ghost of her past.

My world was grayscale until she arrived and unlocked a spectrum of hues. I became an architect of a world just for us, its walls mortared with an unquestioning trust and commitment. But the kingdom was haunted. When the secret door splintered - a hidden room now fully exposed, the stone walls revealed themselves as glass, and my reality shattering along with it. Trying to find the truth afterward was a vertigo of the soul, lost in a house of mirrors where my own pain was twisted and used as a weapon against me.

My search for truth suppressed through an emotionally abusive obstacle course, littered with perfectly scripted narratives and manipulation. Dare I say it was a minefield. But, I'm not just grieving her; I'm mourning the man I was - the one who could trust so recklessly. How do you hold such a funeral?

So I made the hardest choice: I respectfully walked off the battlefield. This grief is a heavy cloak, but there is a strange stillness at its center. It is the peace that comes from choosing your own soul over an illusion. Grief, I've learned, is the price of that peace. And I am finally paying it in full.

But it’s worth it. For I’m now a new man, a man of character, a man of value, a man of wisdom. I look at couples now, and smile to myself with joy, for they are feeling exactly what I felt, hoping in my heart they don’t go through what I did. Now, I’m focusing on myself, treating myself as compassionately as possible. Living the full human experience. Tending to my own fire.

Perhaps, a new chapter awaits. Perhaps.

Written by - Anonymous

Our bench

I’ve passed through that bench a hundred times, but is never the same. Now it isn’t the two of us, it’s just me, and even though he is still alive, it is like he had died 3 years ago the day he left me in that exact bench.

Written by - Anonymous

My children

I’m a separated dad , I’ve not seen my daughter Mimi for 1738 days . I grieve daily despite them still being alive . I’ve been to court , cafcass , everything . Was told to “be patient” by Cafcass. Had no support from them . I have come so close to giving up . I feel guilty for feeling so depressed and so fkin patient & for grieving someone who is still alive . Some days it is too much to bear

Written by - Anonymous

A hole in my heart

He hasn’t passed away, he’s very much alive. My heart aches, every time I think of him. Every time I go to the small town we are from, we bump into each other. Every time. Without fail. I am with someone else now but, my heart hurts and it always will for him.

Written by - Anonymous

Love transcends death

I was walking through Hackney Church, a place I had walked through with George hundreds of times, when your message on the ground really resonated with my grief. George was my world and I feel lost without him but his love lives within me and the people whose lives he touched

Written by - Anonymous