<p>Recollecting, Remembering, Regaining is a research paper that examines the interwoven themes of memory, loss, and repair through feminist theory and practice-based enquiry. Drawing on Julia Kristeva’s concept of abjection, Freud’s uncanny, and Mary Douglas’s idea of “dirt” as matter out of place, the paper considers how fragile, abject materials carry emotional and symbolic weight. Materials, collected from the coastal landscape, become metaphors for absence, transformation, and the unseen labour of care. Rooted in an embodied methodology of gathering, assembling, and mending, the work explores how personal memory intersects with collective histories. Framing loss as an active and cyclical process, the paper positions material practice as a means of reclaiming intimacy, offering a scaffold for reflection, and asserting fragility as a generative, feminist strategy for navigating impermanence.</p>