Video report by Ronke Phillips
The family of murdered schoolgirl Alice Gross said today they would never truly understand why her life was taken away so suddenly.
Speaking for the first time today about their loss, Alice's mother described how she was struggling to cope.
What changes is you ability to manage it. Feelings don't go away. But perhaps the face you put on gets tougher. you get a slightly thicker skin. I don't think you ever really recover. You learn to manage the feeling of loss in slightly different ways.
Credit: ITV News The 14-year-old's body was found in the River Brent, west London, last September. Chief suspect Arnis Zalkalns was later found hanged in nearby woodland. It later emerged he murdered his wife in Latvia.
Alice's sister, Nina, described how the schoolgirl was caring, and fought for equality.
Alice got homework about the EU. They had to basically write - persuading whether they wanted to stay in the EU or out of the EU.
And, one of the arguments that Alice brought up was actually about foreign criminals coming into the UK.
She very clearly said throughout this whole essay that everyone should be treated equally and that you couldn't discriminate against different criminals from different backgrounds because they're from a different place.
Treat them as you would treat someone from the same place.
The whole way through was about fighting for equality. And, that was Alice. She just cared.
>
Credit: ITV News Alice's family say the support they've had from the community has helped them pull through.
It's continued to be amazing.
We've had so many people who've put on event independently of us. We've had small businesses who've donated raffle prizes.
We've had the Hanwell Carnival that renamed their acoustic tent 'Alice's Acoustic Tent'. We did some fundraising at that event.
Credit: ITV News Rosalind says she tries to keep as busy as possible to help keep her mind occupied.
I threw myself into all kinds of charity fundraising and trying to keep going in the things Alice encouraged me in. Alice was a very encouraging daughter. I think she would have wanted us to try to keep going.
We chose that music charity [Youth Music] because Alice's life was very much about music. It was her passion. We're trying through the charity fundraising to honour her memory. Youth Music is a fantastic charity.
Credit: ITV News Alice started performing because her sister also was performing around the age of 7 when she was a member of a group in central London. And Alice spent some days outside watching her sister dance. And when she was old enough she wanted to join in. So, she actually started dance classes at the age of 3. From the aged of 4 or 5 she was almost demanding to learn the violin and got the opportunity at school to do that from about 6 and took to that very quickly.
She wrote her first real song when she was about 10 and, through her teenage years she was writing more and more. Her songs were getting more sophisticated. She wrote lyrics and the music as well.
Credit: ITV News As part of their charity fundraising, Rosalind and Nina are taking part in the Thames Towpath Challenge Missing People
Rosalind is also taking part in the Ealing Half Marathon Youth Music
And, a Concert for Alice is taking place on Tuesday at Ambassadors Theatre
If you would like to support the Alice's Youth Music Memorial Fund, visit the website here .
