When someone close to us dies, dealing with the loss may get easier over time, but the experience will always impact our lives. Jack Antonoff, lead singer of the Bleachers and Lena Dunham's boyfriend, is still grieving his sister 15 years after her death. He used to feel alone for that, but he's since realized this experience is nearly universal, he told People. That's why his band's new album is called "Everybody Lost Somebody."
Jack's little sister Sarah died of brain cancer when she was 13. Soon after, his cousin died in the Iraq War, he told ABC in 2015. This series of events left him feeling like "anything horrible was possible," and he developed "very intense anxiety and depression," he said.
Since then, he's felt divided into two parts, "the part that moves forward and the part that’s frozen," he told People. "It’s very much a then versus now. For me, it’s 18 and younger, when my sister was alive."
Like many artists, he's dealt with his grief by channeling it into his creative pursuits. "Songwriting can be this tool to connect with people and talk about what you are going through," he said. "I used to write from a very lonely place, like, 'Here’s my story, this is it.' Now I’m writing from a place, like: 'Well, everybody has that! Everybody’s got a then and now, and everybody’s trying to figure out how you not let go of the then but also not compromise the now.'"
It's also given him comfort to hear from fans about how his music's touched them. "You can feel less alone — at least that’s why I’ve always written songs," he said. "I see them as sending out a letter with a bird, and then you write it, and it takes forever, and all of a sudden, someone at the other end of the world is like, ‘I feel that way, too! I agree!’ And I’ve always been lucky to meet people who feel the same way about songwriting."
Everybody responds to loss and grieves in their own way. But as Jack points out, just talking about it can help many people, and so kind finding others who will support and care for you.
Related: 7 Things You NEED to Know to Help a Friend Who Lost a Loved One
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