"I got what I wanted. I didn't get what I needed. And for years, I didn't understand the difference."

"I didn't cross the North Sea to prove something. I crossed it to find someone. And she was there the whole time."

"Grief is not only losing someone. It is losing anything precious - a self, a future, a version of the life you thought you were building."

"The mask is very useful, until it isn't. The moment it stops fitting is not a catastrophe. It is an invitation."

"After the worst thing imaginable, everyone can pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and get on with it."

"I was functional. But I wasn't alive. And the worst part is, I'd been that way so long I'd stopped noticing the difference."