"we mourn people of whom we can say, “I was his lack.” More specifically, we mourn people vis-à-vis whom we do not know whether we fulfill this function of being at the place of their lack (January 30, 1963). What we give in love is essentially what we do not have, and when what we do not have is returned to us, this gift reveals how much we have failed the person in representing his or her lack. … Whereas the object of the need can be lost, the object of desire is mythical, it never existed as an actual object and yet has to be “lost”"

- A Lacanian Reader for Psychologists