Losing a mother — or any type of maternal figure — evokes lots of complicated feelings for all of us, no matter how old we are when we experience it. If we’re young, we may feel regret and frustration that she won’t get to see the person we become. And at any age, we may feel at a loss as to how to carry on as we’re forced to adjust to life without her.
This loss, like any type of grief, can also make us feel very isolated. As actor Andrew Garfield said after his mother’s passing, “It’s so strange because it feels very unique when it is happening. It feels like, ‘Oh my God, I’m the only person that’s ever lost their mother,’ because it does feel so lonely and precise.”
Michelle Zauner echoed a similar sentiment in Crying in H Mart, her acclaimed 2021 memoir about coping with her mother’s death, when she wrote, “It felt like the world had divided into two different types of people, those who had felt pain and those who had yet to.”
Obviously and unfortunately, losing a mother is something many of us will go through in our lifetimes. Regardless, it just feels different when it happens to us. “No one has lost my mother. No one besides me knows the exact size and shape of the hole she leaves behind in the world.”
No matter where you’re at in the grieving process, we hope these quotes will help soothe your heart and remind you of the power of a mother’s love to transcend even death.
The mother memories that are closest to my heart are the small, gentle ones that I have carried over from the days of my childhood. They are not profound, but they have stayed with me through life. And when I am very old, they will still be near.Margaret Sanger
How cyclical and bittersweet for a child to retrace the image of their mother. For a subject to turn back to document their archivist.Michelle Zauner
Grief and love are conjoined, you don’t get one without the other. All I can do is love her and love the world, emulate her by living with daring and spirit and joy.Jandy Nelson
I cannot forget my mother. She is my bridge. When I needed to get across, she steadied herself long enough for me to run across safely.Renita Weems
I chose not to lose my mom, and instead to gain an angel. In my mind, my heart, and my life, she is still completely present to this day — and as wise, compassionate, and stubborn as ever.Kevin Hart
“There is no death, daughter. People die only when we forget them,” my mother explained shortly before she left me. “If you can remember me, I will be with you always.”Isabel Allende
The world didn’t make sense, and it still doesn’t, because I miss her greatly, and I hope it never makes sense because I always want to miss her.Andrew Garfield
It was only after her death that I realized who she was: the apparently magical force at the center of our family who'd kept us all invisibly spinning in the powerful orbit around her.Cheryl Strayed
I realized a couple of days after she passed that no one would ever love me like that again. I wouldn’t put that kind of sparkle in anybody’s eye, you know? … But then I thought, this would really piss her off for sure, if I said that. She’d be like, “Really? Really? How many times have you been married? You don’t think you’ve put a sparkle in people’s eye? Get out of here.”Whoopi Goldberg
I couldn’t help but wonder if my first breath was as soul-stirring to my mother as her last breath was to me.Lisa Goich
Never. We never lose our loved ones. They accompany us; they don’t disappear from our lives. We are merely in different rooms.Paulo Coelho
My mother is a never-ending song in my heart of comfort, happiness, and being. I may sometimes forget the words but I always remember the tune.Graycie Harmon
I know in my head that she has gone, but I still keep looking. The only difference is that I am getting used to the pain. It’s like discovering a great hole in the ground. To begin with, you forget it’s there and you keep falling in. After a while, it’s still there, but you learn to walk round it.Rachel Joyce
Featured image credit: Turac Novruzova/ Stock
