What About George?

Fred Weasley’s death in Book 7 is considered to be one of the most difficult losses that the fandom experienced. He was charming, caring, fun-loving, and overall likable. He and his brother provided the books with a bit of necessary comic relief, taking the reader away from the gravity of Lord Voldemort’s emergence, in favor of puns, jokes, witty remarks, and clever comebacks. But what about George? What happened to him after Fred’s death?

Several Harry Potter websites have explained that George Weasley goes on to marry Angelina Johnson, have two children, and continue his ownership of Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes. Though the fandom can speculate the stress that has been placed on him following the death of his twin, what exactly happens to twins who have experienced this loss?

A “twinless twin” is someone who has lost his or her twin at some point in his or her life, whether it occurred during their births, in adolescence, or in adulthood. In each situation, the surviving twin claims to feel as though a part of him or her is missing completely; this makes sense, since fraternal twins share about 50% of the same genetics and identical twins share about 100% of their genes. This emptiness often results in serious depression, even worse than the sadness that the rest of the family feels.

Often times, twinless twins feel guilty that they outlived their twins, believing that perhaps it should have been them in the twins’ place. Since George witnessed the death of Fred, it can be assumed that this thought floated through George’s mind; he may have believed that he should have been killed in the explosion instead, so the brother he loved so much could live on in his place.

Does the twin ever leave them? Physically, of course. Mentally, it is believed that twinless twins carry on the memory of their lost one by “living for two,” doing things the other would have done in his or her honor. It has been said that George named his son Fred in his brother’s honor; this proves that as time passes, he will never let go of this loss.

To sum it up, George most likely experienced serious PTSD, feeling empty, lonely, and incomplete. For months, or years, he may have had trouble in familial and romantic relationships out of fear that he would lose someone close to him again. However, he eventually realized that Fred wouldn’t have wanted him to be that way, so he pursued girls (Angelina specifically), reopened the shop, and continued to live his life the way Fred would have wanted him to.