The First Year Without Them
A quiet companion for the days when the calendar keeps moving, while your own sense of time has changed.
If you are facing a first year without someone you love, this free PDF offers a gentle place to reflect on difficult days and carry love forward in a way that feels personal to you.
First name and email only
The First Year
Without Them
A gentle place for reflection, difficult days, and carrying love forward.
Read it slowly. Return when you need a quiet page.
A companion, not a timetable
The first year can hold many different kinds of day.
Some days may ask for words. Others may ask for quiet. A familiar song, an anniversary, or an ordinary moment can each bring a different kind of feeling.
The First Year Without Them offers a gentle place to pause and reflect without asking you to follow a fixed path. You can read the pages in your own time, keep what feels useful, and return whenever you need to.
Inside the book
A quiet resource for the pages that feel harder to write.
The book gives you a little space to notice what you are carrying, without needing to explain your grief to anyone else.
Gentle reflection
A quiet invitation to pause and notice what this season of grief is bringing up for you.
Space for difficult days
A resource to return to when a date, memory, or ordinary moment feels especially heavy.
Carrying love forward
Room to consider the love and memories that remain part of your life as the year unfolds.
Receive your copy
A small next step, when you are ready.
Share your first name and email to receive The First Year Without Them. The PDF will appear on screen straight away, and the link will also be sent to your inbox.
Share two simple details
Enter your first name and email address. No details about your loss are requested.
Choose what follows
Confirm the book delivery, then decide separately whether you would like occasional support emails.
Read in your own time
Open the PDF straight away and keep the email link for a day when you want to return.
You do not need to share the story of your loss to receive the book.
Get the free book
Enter your details below. We will make the PDF available here and email you a copy of the link.
A gentle boundary: This book and Gwen's service are not emergency or crisis care, medical care, or a replacement for appropriate NHS support.