Liam Payne’s sister Ruth has shared a deeply emotional tribute to her late brother on the first anniversary of his death, saying she feels “paralyzed with grief” since losing him.
The One Direction star tragically passed away last October at the age of 31 after falling from the balcony of his third-floor hotel room in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
A year later, Ruth opened up about her heartbreak in a moving open letter, reflecting on the pain that continues to shape her every day.
“I underestimated the sadness, woah, did I underestimate it. I’m paralyzed by it every day,” she wrote, according The sun.
“I thought I had felt it before, but I know that the losses for you were only intense sadness. You are the loss of my life, the one person I will miss at every opportunity in my life. I assumed that my little brother would be there with me all my life. You should not have died.”
Ruth described being haunted by a recurring nightmare that places her back in Liam’s hotel room in his final moments.
“You can’t hear me screaming for you, my brain is locked to your last minutes on this earth, the unaccounted for minutes, the minutes I will never have the answers for, the minutes that changed everything,” she shared.
The pain, she said, has left the Payne family feeling “numb” and “impossible to heal.” She went on to explain that his absence affects her before each day even begins.
“You died and that’s something that happened, but your absence is something that happens to me every day before I even open my eyes.”
In heartbreaking detail, Ruth shared what she would do if she could spend just five more minutes with him, from discussing their plans and sharing jokes to simply listening to the birds together.
“I would tell you how proud I am of you, not just proud of your job, proud of the person you are, we would leave with the ‘love you mate’ and as I drove away you would be waving in my rear view mirror,” she wrote.
She ended her message by reminding others that behind the headlines and public attention is a family still grieving.
“While I’m still on my knees struggling to regain balance since my world burned down, and every time I try to take a step, something comes along and sets fire to all the progress I thought I’ve made… everyone only seems interested in the public side of this,” Ruth said.
“Some unfortunately seem more interested in the fame this can bring them, but on the human side people need to remember that when they speak, there is a son without his father, parents without their child and I am lost without my brother. Love always Liam, in every life.”
Ruth also continues to express her grief on social media.
Liam’s other sister, Nicola, also shared a message of her own, describing the day he died as “the day our lives changed forever and were left with our hearts broken and pieces missing.”
She reflected on the difficulty of facing even a fraction of the public criticism her brother faced, calling it “unbearable.”
Nicola, mother of Liam’s niece Ffion, vowed to keep his memory alive for his son Bear, who he shares with Cheryl Tweedy.
“We will make sure Bear knows everything about the amazing dad he has, not just your achievements and success over the years, but all the things that made you you,” she wrote.
Clinging to the belief that Liam is still watching over them, she added, “Sometimes I find comfort in knowing that you can see the things I want to share with you, but other times it breaks my heart that we can no longer hear about your life or share ours.”
