Lottie Tomlinson is finding gentle ways to keep her late mother’s memory alive for her children.
The 26-year-old influencer and beauty entrepreneur—best known as the sister of One Direction’s Louis Tomlinson—opened up on ITV’s Lorraine about how she’s helping her children connect with the grandmother they never got to meet.
Lottie’s mother, Johannah Deakin, tragically passed away in 2016 at just 43 years old, after a battle with leukemia. Now a mum herself to two children—Lucky, who turns three next month, and seven-month-old Flossie—Lottie is beginning to share Johannah’s legacy with them.
“My little boy is just turning three, so we are just starting to introduce the idea to him now,” Lottie explained. “Just because she’s not physically here, it doesn’t mean she can’t be a part of their life.”
She’s committed to ensuring that her children understand how important Johannah was and continues to be in their lives, even in spirit.
“I would always want them to know about her and know how important she was to me, so I’ll definitely make sure they know who she is.”
The grief of motherhood without her own mum has been especially hard. Johannah was a midwife, and Lottie had always imagined she’d be there to guide her through pregnancy and birth.
“It’s been really hard. My mum was a midwife, so we would always speak about the fact she would help me through the birth and everything. So not having her there for that was really tough.”
She added that there were so many moments—especially in early motherhood—where she wished she could ask for advice or lean on her mother’s support.
“It’s just the fact she’s not going to know my kids, which is such a hard thing to come to terms with. But you just have to keep trying to remind yourself that they’re watching. All the lessons she taught me, I take on, and I’m so grateful for that.”
Lottie’s journey through grief has been marked by multiple family tragedies. After losing her mother, she was rocked again in 2019 when her younger sister, Félicité Tomlinson, died of a drug overdose at just 18.
“When something as big as losing a parent happens, you never expect it to get any worse than that. And then it did,” she reflected. “So it was a really tough time for the whole family, but we’ve really stuck together and we’ve managed to come out the other side.”
Now, as she raises her children and honors her mother’s memory, Lottie continues to use her platform to talk about grief, healing, and family—offering strength to others walking a similar path.
