Thomas Horn Quotes

Part of the healing process is sharing with other people who care.

Knowing that you're not alone, and that people genuinely care, is really important.

Everybody has losses - it's unavoidable in life. Sharing our pain is very healing.

When our William was killed, there wasn't a child bereavement charity. I was extremely blessed with a very close family, wonderful friends, a supportive husband, and two further children.

To share our stories is not only a worthwhile endeavor for the storyteller, but for those who hear our stories and feel less alone because of it.

Once you lose your parents, you get this numbness, this feeling of having to really be able to connect yourself with someone. I depended on my brothers for that connection, but to have that feeling of being taken care of... I lost it when my parents passed away.

What people don't realize is that everybody needs support, one way or another.

I needed New Orleans so badly back in 2006, just somebody to believe in me, somebody to care about me.

Trauma happens in relationships, so it can only be healed in relationships. Art can't provide healing. It can be cathartic and therapeutic but a relationship is a three-part journey.

I couldn't have foreseen all the good things that have followed my mother's death. The renewed energy, the surprising sweetness of grief. The tenderness I feel for strangers on walkers. The deeper love I have for my siblings and friends. The desire to play the mandolin. The gift of a visitation.

She is a friend of mind. She gather me, man. The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order. It's good, you know, when you got a woman who is a friend of your mind.

America had taken my father from me. And over most of the years of his illness, I gradually started feeling this support system from this country who-people grieving along with us.

When you've lost a loved one, you realise how grateful you are for any help in those moments, and any scheme that tries to help families during that terrible time gets my backing.

For example, when my mother died, the people who showed up just to put an apron on to cook, people who really do the right thing, so to speak, as my momma would always say to show that they care, a sense of community that we've lost so much in our country.

It's always good to have other people who you can lean on and pick you up when you're down and vice versa.

Pay attention to your friends; pay attention to that cousin that jumps up on the picnic table at the family reunion and goes a little too 'nutty,' you know what I mean? Pay attention to that aunt that's down in the basement that never comes upstairs. We have to pay attention to our friends, pay attention to your family, and offer a hand.

That's the number one rule after you lose someone is go to somebody else, go to the people around you, be with the people that you love.

I just know that I’m not willing to let anything happen to you. When Nynia died, I was so lost and cold, and I haven’t been warm since. Not until I felt your hands on me. The only way I’ve been able to cope without you is to bury what I feel, but I can’t seem to do that anymore. When I’m with you all I can do is feel and need. (Talon)

Growing up in Ireland, when my family received important news, good or bad, we would boil water and make tea. It was the first thing I did when my father died in 1984. This ritual allowed me a moment to take in the enormity of what had happened.

Social support is everything.

I was very empty after my father passed away. It was an emotional time, as it would be for anyone, but to be in the studio every day was kind of cathartic and healing and it just seemed very natural to continue.

There's a general impulse to distract the grieving person - as if you could.

I'm lucky to have a great support system in my friends and some of my family. If you have those people that you trust, go ahead and fall back into them and let them be your hammock and cocoon and let them embrace you.

You don't stop thinking about women just because your wife dies. It's terrible, but you know. I just want the hugs, the kisses. A kiss!

If I'm having a really bad day, I always have a girlfriend - or even a guy friend - who I can call. They'll listen to me wallow for a minute and then be like, 'Okay, let's stop. Everything's great. Let's figure out how to fix whatever's bothering you.'