‘I am dealing with an unconventional grief.

My grandad was 86 when he died. I was 9. I was lucky really with how long I knew him, being able to live for much of my childhood at the same time as all my grandparents. But in the last few years of my grandad’s life his mental and physical health very quickly deteriorated. As a young child, it was very hard to understand why he never really left the chair in his room. But also, why my cousins who are all older than me had such clear, positive memories of him from their own childhoods.

I only have one clear memory of grandad from my early childhood that really sticks with me; at around 5 years old I got my first ever kiddizoom camera and I filmed a video travelling from the lounge, up the stairs to my grandad’s room where he was sat in his chair. This video was my favourite as a child. I used to rewatch it all the time.

What stands out to me when I remember this is how much my grandad also loved documenting his life. He had boxes of pristine negatives in perfect order that I got to keep when my nan died. I really feel similarities within his work and my own; that love for documenting life and capturing memories which I think is an inherited feeling, passed down through family.

This feeling and shared passion forges a connection between us. Something that makes me want to understand him more and learn about him as a person. To create something that brings our spirits together, something that I would’ve loved to have been able to show him. Finding that thing that would have bound us, had he been living through it with me. I know this process isn’t and will probably never be completed, but I am hoping it will start patching up this feeling of something missing.’