Grief in any form is one of life's biggest challenges, but losing one's mom is a particularly difficult journey. These loss of mother quotes help honor the beautiful connections mothers make with their children.
Jimmy Fallon's mom, Gloria, passed away in 2017 at age 68. Three years later, Fallon opened up about the special bond the two had and the struggles he went through following her death.
“Today is the three-year anniversary of my mom passing away and I just wanted to say to anyone whose mom has died that it’s hard. It’s really, really hard,” he said on "The Tonight Show."
“You think that maybe time will go by and you might forget about her, but you don’t,” he continued. “Not a day goes by, and you think about her when anything happens in the news, or anything that’s happening that you think she’d laugh about.”
Loss of Mother Quotes
- “In Vietnamese, the word for missing someone and remembering them is the same: nhớ.” — Ocean Vuong, "On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous"
- “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, "I Can't Make This Up"
- “Every time I see an angel, I think of her … I know she is an angel.” – Nicolas Cage
- “My mother is in heaven and she still sees me through her eyes … It’s like God gave me a little piece of heaven on Earth with my mom.” — Rihanna
- “We cannot think our way out of grief. We must feel our way out of grief.” — Angie Corbett-Kuiper
- "There is something about losing a mother that is permanent and inexpressible — a wound that will never quite heal." — Susan Wiggs, "The Goodbye Quilt"
- "A great soul serves everyone all the time. A great soul never dies. It brings us together again and again." — Maya Angelou
- “I know in my head that she has gone. 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 keep falling in. After a while, it’s still there, but you learn to walk ‘round it.” — Rachel Joyce
- "I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life." — Abraham Lincoln
- “She is still everywhere with us. She is the air we breathe, she occupies our every thought and fills each moment of our lives … We carry her within ourselves and will never be able to free ourselves from this eternal bond.” — Jacques Prévert
- "Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything." — C.S. Lewis, "A Grief Observed"
- “Motherhood: All love begins and ends there.” — Robert Browning
- “Losing a mother doesn’t happen in a moment. It takes years to appreciate the impact of what’s gone.” — Lisa-Jo Baker
- “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
- “My mother was always available to me. Even when I didn’t see her, she wasn’t gone.” — Brooke Shields
- “If I made a list of the people I admire, Mom would probably fill up half of it. She could do anything and everything.” — Patsy Cline
- “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, "The Sky Is Everywhere"
- “I realized when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know." — Mitch Albom, "For One More Day"
- “But there’s a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking. But behind all your stories is always your mother’s story, because hers is where yours begin.” — Mitch Albom, "For one More Day"
- “I know for certain that we never lose the people we love, even to death. They continue to participate in every act, thought, and decision we make. Their love leaves an indelible imprint in our memories. We find comfort in knowing that our lives have been enriched by having shared their love.” — Leo Buscaglia
- “You were my home, Mother. I had no home but you” — Janet Fitch, "White Oleander"
- "A mother loves without expecting anything in return. She gives without expecting anyone to be grateful for it. … All her life she wakes up every morning and does everything all over again.” — Debasish Mridha
- "There are no goodbyes for us. Wherever you are, you will always be in my heart." — Mahatma Gandhi
- "How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard." — Winnie the Pooh
- “I’m not afraid of heaven. I believe in it the way I believe that my mother is with me, hovering over me, even though she’s no longer alive.” — Leonard Cohen
- "What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us." — Helen Keller
- "Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form." — Rumi
- "I hope she’s looking down, you know, with tears in her eyes, being incredibly proud of what we’ve established, I suppose. I’m sure she’s longing for me to have kids so she can be a grandmother again. I hope that everything we do privately and officially, that it makes her proud." — Prince Harry
- “You can feel when your mom’s proud of you, and you can feel the love, and just know that she doesn’t go away.” — Jimmy Fallon
- "There is something so beautiful waking up to the calm ocean, and a stunning angel ray ... which I know is from my mum!!! She ALWAYS shone the brightest, that’s for sure!!!” — Lisa Riley
- “My life has changed. She’s more than my music. If I could trade music to have her back, I would. I always hear her say, ‘Keep going and keep doing it.’” — Bruno Mars
- “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
- "It feels just like a precise agony and for a period of time I didn’t want to, and I wasn’t able to, do anything. I was kind of wasted and 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
- "I have definitely seen the highest of the highs and the lowest of the lows. You don’t know how strong you are until you are placed in that kind of moment." — Jennifer Hudson
- “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
- “Grief is a curious thing, when it happens unexpectedly. It is a Band-Aid being ripped away, taking the top layer off a family. And the underbelly of a household is never pretty, ours no exception.” ― Jodi Picoult
- “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.’ So, I got over myself.” — Whoopi Goldberg
- "We understand death only after it has placed its hands on someone we love." — Madame De Stael
- “There is no death, daughter. People only die 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, "Eva Luna"
- “I wonder if my first breath was as soul-stirring to my mother as her last breath was to me.”― Lisa Goich-Andreadis, "14 Days: A Mother, A Daughter, A Two Week Goodbye"
- “Your absence has gone through me like thread through a needle. Everything I do is stitched with its color." — W.S. Merwin
- “My mother was the one constant in my life. When I think about my mom raising me alone when she was 20, and working and paying the bills, and, you know, trying to pursue your own dreams, I think it is a feat that is unmatched.” — Barack Obama
