"Separate your love from someone's ability to show up When David Cox's mother died during his seventh-grade year, he was surprised by the depth of his own grief, having told himself he did not care about her since she had barely been present for five years. He reflects: 'turns out I really loved my mother,' even though the connection was 'a very thin tether.' This reveals a non-obvious truth — you can love someone deeply and simultaneously be clear-eyed that their presence in your life is harmful or absent, and conflating those two things can blind you to unprocessed grief that will surface anyway. Source: David Cox, Armchair Expert, David Cox Episode"