I’ve been mulling over how to write about today’s newsletter, and whether I should even post it at all.

I’ve spoken about grief before. But I’ve never really gone into it properly.

Then I caught myself asking a familiar question — how do I tie this back to mental health… or music?

After all, this is The Mental Musician.

But the truth is, I don’t always write about music. From the beginning, this was about the life behind the musician. The parts you don’t see. The parts that don’t make it onto a stage.

Because no matter what you do — musician, accountant, barber, florist, chef — there are some experiences that don’t care about your job title.

Like… scrolling Instagram on the toilet.

Alright, that one might just be universal.

Anyway… that’s me trying to lighten the mood before I say what I actually want to say.

Both my grandmas are now gone.

My mum’s mum passed away in May 2017.
My dad’s mum passed away just over a month ago, on March 6th, 2026.

For the sake of this story, I’ll call my mum’s mum Po Po, and my dad’s mum Nai Nai.

I don’t actually know the exact date Po Po passed away.

I was overseas in the U.S. at the time — doing what most 19-year-olds do after finishing school. Travelling. Seeing the world. Trying to become someone.

Maybe I’ve just never had the courage to ask my mum for the exact date.

So instead, I pretend the last day I saw her — May 20th, 2017 — was the last day she was here.

I was 19 when she passed. It was the first real loss I’d experienced.

At the time, my relationship with my parents was strained. I hadn’t spoken to my brother in two years. I’d drifted away from most of my cousins.

Po Po felt like the only person in my family who loved me simply for being me.

She didn’t pressure me.
She didn’t judge me for mistakes.
She always had a red pocket ready when I saw her.

Maybe that’s why she was my favourite.

If you’ve ever had someone like that, you’ll understand what it feels like when they’re gone.

It’s not just grief. It’s a kind of quiet disconnection.

Like you’ve lost the one place where you felt understood without having to explain yourself.

For a long time, it made me feel like I didn’t really belong anywhere in my family.

It probably helped — or at least distracted me — that I was about to leave for a three-month trip overseas.

I carried the guilt with me – like a backpack filled with stones that I never really put down.

But travelling gave me just enough distance to convince myself I was okay. That life could still be enjoyable, as long as I kept moving.

That’s how I dealt with it.

I kept going.

I didn’t stop to think about what had happened. I didn’t talk to anyone about it. I didn’t even properly acknowledge how I felt.

And looking back now, that’s when I started running away from my problems and convincing myself that I was okay.

Running. Avoiding. Keeping busy so I didn’t have to sit with anything real.

But grief doesn’t care how far you travel. It waits.

That was the first time I learned something I’ve come back to again and again:

You can’t outrun grief.

You can delay it. Distract yourself. Fill your life with noise.

But eventually, it finds you.

My depression was already there, growing quietly in the background.

My anxiety wasn’t far behind.

But instead of facing any of it, I made a decision — whether I realised it or not — to double down on music.

If I could become the best guitarist I could be…
If I could build a career…
If I could “make it”…

Then I’d be okay.

At least, that’s what I told myself.

Po Po’s death felt sudden. At least to me.

I knew she had been sick. But I never thought it would happen that quickly.

And for years, that turned into something else.

A quiet kind of guilt that never really left.

Because if I hadn’t been so caught up in my own world…
If I hadn’t been so focused on myself…

Maybe I would’ve spent more time with her.

I just assumed there would always be another dinner. Another visit. Another chance.

I didn’t even know she had moved into a nursing home.

That’s the part that eats away at me.

The same story almost repeated itself with Nai Nai.

Last year, my dad told me her time was coming to an end. He asked me to visit her as much as I could.

You’d think I would’ve learned by then.

But I didn’t.

I visited maybe once a month. Sometimes only when my dad asked.

Part of me thought I was just busy.

Another part of me knew I was avoiding it.

I didn’t want to go through that feeling again.

I was already carrying years of guilt from Po Po.

So somewhere in my head, I convinced myself that if I kept a bit of distance, it might not hurt as much this time.

The truth is, I barely knew Nai Nai growing up.

I only met her when I was 13. After that, I saw her maybe once a year.

Between 2015 and 2025, I saw her once.

And this is where it gets really uncomfortable for me to admit.

There was a part of me that thought… if I didn’t get too close, then losing her wouldn’t affect me the same way.

It sounds cold when I say it out loud.

But at the time, it felt logical. It made sense.

Looking back now, I can see how it wasn’t just about avoiding grief.

It was about not letting myself feel the pain that came with grief.

But then a friend told me the story of when her Dad passed away.

The night before, they tried to have a Skype call, but the connection kept cutting out. She got frustrated and said, “We’ll just try again tomorrow.”

There wasn’t a tomorrow.

For a long time, that moment stayed with her. The grief and guilt of not getting to say goodbye, not having that call, not picking up the phone… it drained her.

But over time, she came to accept something.

That one missed call didn’t define their relationship.

That her Dad was proud of her.

And that up until that point, she had the kind of Dad most people would be lucky to have.

In a strange way, that stuck with me more than anything else.

Because it made me realise that holding onto everything I didn’t do… wasn’t going to change anything.

If anything, it would just keep me stuck there.

So when it came to Nai Nai, I knew this wasn’t about making up for lost time.

It was about making use of the time I still had.

With that time, I learnt so much about my Nai Nai that made me feel like I actually knew her all my life.

She loved music just as much as I did. She was a music teacher before she met her husband, my Grandpa — a.k.a. my Ye Ye. She also bought two electric guitars for me and brought them over to Sydney when she moved here in 2011.

To be honest, that didn’t help my guilt at all, because I sold both guitars in 2016 for a miserly $100 each. Some grateful grandson I was.

I still imagine that, like a fairytale in a K-drama, somehow, some way, I’d track down the people I sold those guitars to. Make a few calls, book a flight to the other side of the country, and in some act of pure kindness, they’d just hand them back.

But those sort of fairytales don’t really come true.

The ones that do are the ones you actually live, not the ones you sit there wishing for.

Despite my Nai Nai being the one who kickstarted my guitar journey, I had never actually played for her.

So I promised myself that every time I visited her at the hospital, I’d bring my guitar and play for her.

She wanted me to sing and dance too. But I joked with her that I wanted her last few days to be peaceful. Watching me sing and dance would not provide her that peace.

Even now, part of me thinks maybe I should’ve.

That’s the thing about life though. There’s always something you feel like you should’ve done.

We spend so much time thinking about that, we forget to look at what we did do.

I know I just said that the fairytales you wish for don’t come true.

I lied.

My one wish was simple.

I just wanted to make sure she would see me play guitar for her, right up until her final breath.

While my guitar gently wept for her.
(That’s my attempt at turning a song title into a pun.)

In those moments, I realised something I hadn’t properly understood before.

Both my Po Po and Nai Nai believed in me.

Not because of what I achieved.
Not because of who I was trying to become.

Just because I was me.

Even when speaking was painful, even when every word took effort, my Nai Nai would still remind me to eat properly, get some rest, and keep playing guitar.

(This was one of the songs I played for my Nai Nai. Shout out to my Canadian mate Calum Graham for writing this gorgeous song)

Some people — secretly or not so secretly — get excited about what their grandparents leave behind.

A vintage clock worth thousands.
An old car worth even more.
A photo album full of memories.

What my Po Po and Nai Nai left me with isn’t something you can measure like that.

They made me feel like I belonged.

Like I had a place in my family.

Like I didn’t have to try to be anything other than myself.

It sounds cheesy, I know.

But for most of my life, I felt like there wasn’t really a place for me. Not in my family. Not in the world.

They gave me that feeling back.

I just wish they were here a little longer, so they could see what that looks like now.

Even if it was just for one more day.

But I’d like to think they know.

At the time of writing this, I don’t think I fully understand what grief means to me.

When Po Po passed, I was in Europe a week later — jamming with mates, meeting people in Airbnbs, sleeping in airports because American Airlines did what American Airlines does best.

When Nai Nai passed, life didn’t look like that.

I went back to work.
I kept writing.
I had dinner with my girlfriend.
I checked in with my Dad and his family each day.

But this time feels different.

Last time, I didn’t let grief in.

This time, I know it’s coming.

I still can’t bring myself to look at the photos and videos I took while playing guitar for her.

But I know I will.

When I’m ready.

I’m not trying to force it.
I’m not trying to avoid it either.

I just know it’ll come.

And when it does, I’ll let it do what it needs to do.

For now, I’m just glad she knew.

That her love for music lives on through me. That I was there.

And maybe, in some way, this time…

I’ve finally stopped running.

Thank you so much for reading my newsletter today. It really means a lot and if you have lost someone close to you in your life, I hope this helps you find a bit of comfort. It’s something we all go through, and I know that I will lose a few more people as I get older. Unfortunately that’s life. But it doesn’t take away from the time we have with our loved ones. So as cliche as it is, make use of the time you have with them.

If you did enjoy today’s newsletter, do me a favour and go give your parents, your siblings, boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, best friends, and even your favourite colleagues a hug. Play them a song, or sing a song together.

You’ll cherish that last memory you have with them, and for me at least, getting that last day with my Nai Nai has helped ease the grief.

I’d also appreciate if you could do me another favour and share my newsletter around with your friends and family, especially with someone who’s experiencing grief at the moment.

The more you share, the more we can help more and more people who are going through something similar, and help musicians find ways to express their pain without having to hide behind their music.

And if you want to see more content around opening up, being honest and vulnerable, you can check out my new podcast episode.

And here’s my latest YouTube video which funnily enough is about finding hope in your darkest moments: