What do you think When I'm Gone means?

Eminem: When I'm Gone Meaning

Album cover for When I'm Gone album cover

Song Released: 2005


When I'm Gone Lyrics

Yeah...
It's my life...
My own words I guess...

[Verse 1]
Have you ever loved someone so much, you'd give an arm for?
Not the expression, no, literally give an arm for?
When they know they're your heart
And you know you were their...

  1. 1TOP RATED

    #1 top rated interpretation:
    anonymous
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    Jan 8th 2011 !⃝

    I don't know exactly the interpretation obviously only Em would know that. I'm not a huge fan but my brother was and he took this song seriously. This song is the reason my brother turned his life around. He learned from Em's mistakes. When my brother found out he had a son he joined the army he wanted his son to be first and know he was loved. Just as Em wanted for Hailey. My brother went to Afghanistan and didn't make it out, and every time I hear this song I hear my brother singing the chorus. This song is the reason I kept breathing after they told me he wasn't coming home. I now have the chorus tattooed on my shoulder blade. So thank you Em for giving me this memory.

  2. 2TOP RATED

    #2 top rated interpretation:
    anonymous
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    Oct 16th 2013 !⃝

    Eminem’s album “Curtain Call” is mainly his reflection on the previous four years of his life and what he’s become. He changed from being broke and struggling to provide for his family, to wealthy, but he still feels as if he has failed his family. For example, in his song “When I’m Gone” he sings of his daughter Hailie saying; "Daddy please, daddy don't leave, daddy, no stop it!" (Eminem). He sings from Hailie’s perspective because he knows that he has told her countless times he won’t leave anymore. Despite his promises, he always chose his fame and fortune over Hailie and his wife, Kim. Later in the song, Eminem kills his alter ego; “‘I turn around, find a gun on the ground and cock it. Put it to my brain, scream, "Die Shady" and pop it’” (Eminem). Eminem raps about killing himself because he has once again abandoned his daughter to tour and do drugs. One reason this is important is because he doesn’t kill “Eminem”; he kills “Shady.” He links the savage and evil side of himself to this alter ego which he refers to as Slim Shady. Finally, he wakes up and, instead of going back to his old ways of treating his family, he “walk[s] right up to Kim and kiss[es] her, tell[s] her he miss[es] her, Hailie just smiles and winks at her little sister” (Eminem). Eminem doesn’t actually wake up, he comes to the realization that he has hurt his family and tries to change his attitude at home to comfort them. Hailie sees that he is trying to change to become a better father and winks at her little sister as if to tell her that things will be much better in the future. This song, and a good amount of the other songs in “Curtain Call,” hint at Eminem’s new attitude towards life and clue in at the brightness of his future.

  3. 3TOP RATED

    #3 top rated interpretation:
    anonymous
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    Apr 11th 2006 !⃝

    All the other interpretations are and they don't know what there talking about. This song is not to any of us or any us his fans, it's to his daughter about how she is everything to him and he didn't relize that working so much hurt her and he fells so bad now and how she d how he left her all the time to preform for his fans as if the work is more important to him. This was all a dream and he realizes that his family is more important to him.

  4. anonymous
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    Jul 14th 2019 !⃝

    I think the song had a lot of meanings one thing stood out to me sure Eminem makes promises to his kid but doesnt every father to their kids but Eminem breaks the promises he makes to his daughter and every promise he breaks is another part of her heart that breaks when i was just 6 years old my father James promised me he would call me every night but he didnt i would sit on my bed with the phone in my hand it got to the point where i dted up untill 1:00 am waiting for my father to call but he never did i was 13 the last time heard from him i'm now 15 going on 16 and i still expect something from him the part where his auto ego gets killed the madness of not seeing or hearing from my father drove me to try and end my life age 12 and again aged 15 but ad Eminem turned his life aroumd i did too i fell in love with a nice guy and took on his little boy aged 1 and a half most people wouldnt expect me to take on someone else kud but i have and i am proud of it thanks to Em i have learnt to make up for my mistakes and be there for my fianceè and his boy i used to put my work first but now my family comes first in everything i do.

  5. Themysticalwolf
    click a star to vote
    May 7th 2019 !⃝

    "I'm just happy not to be that person anymore...my wife is too" the guy says that in the opening. He's a but older then Eminem. But, maybe it's like his future self is telling him about things that might happen if and when he changed.
    " yeah, it's my life" he says, as an opening referance.
    " Have you ever loved someone so much you give an arm for, not the expression, no litteraly give and arm for" we then see him quickly show off his tattoo which shows Hailey.
    " And you will destroy anyone who tries to harm her," later he qoutes " But what happens when Karma turns around and bites you? When you become the main sourse of her pain" It's not physical pain he's talking about. It's the pain that comes when he has to leave them alone, or when he argues with their mother.
    " Daddy look what I made, dad's gotta go catch a plane" he clearly accepts the fault, even giving evidence to what kind of emotional pain he gave her when he wasn't there, even if he wanted to be a father figure for her.
    " Daddy, where's mommy, I can't find mommy" she cries to him, as if to ask, where is mommy. Why can she come home? He explains this in Mockingbird as well, with Kim moving away and going around, not doing the healthiest things, while the young girls are left to be nutured by their father, who pushes them away for his work
    " I don't know Haeliy, go play, your daddy's busy." He says later on.
    " And put hands on her mother who's a spitting image of her" He's stating that he and Kim weren't the best of lovers, and their relationship had been so unstable that he might've hit Kim, blinded by rage.
    " Yeah baby slim shady's crazy" His ego is shady. The personality he contians when rapping for the world. He accidently put this into his home life too. He admits to his daughters that he was a bit crazy and wild, and not so responsible as their father figure.
    " You always say that! You always say this is the last time. But daddy your not leaving no more, daddy your lying." He says, using Hailey's point of view. She seems upset about him leaving and not being able to be a father she need in her life, while Kim is not there for her.
    In the last verse, we see Hailiy begging her father to come help her and her mother. To put the broken family back together
    " Help mommy! Her wrists are bleedin'." She screams at him, but Emiemn is confused to why his daughter is here. She fires back, telling him the truthm, saying this at the last part of her clapback:
    " And you made mommy sad"
    then the last part
    " Fine, I get the point, me and mommy are leaving" like saying she accepts it, and she chooses her mother over her father going to help her cause " her wrists are bleeding". That's all for now.

  6. anonymous
    click a star to vote
    May 16th 2018 !⃝

    When I was younger my father was never there because he did drugs and he would drink all the time. My father use to beat my mom when she was pregnant with me.This song and Mockingbird are very important to me. They match my life story. I haven't been through the things his daughters when through, and they went through a lot more than me. My dad left because he didn't want me, he wanted my mom to get an abortion but she wouldn't. He would cook meth when I was in the house and I was only 2 weeks old.

  7. anonymous
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    Nov 21st 2017 !⃝

    its about how eminem keeps leaving his wife Kim, and daughter Hailey to go on tour and perform for his fans and how he would do anything to change that.he would do anything for her like give an arm for her. and while he's on tour in the video she appears and tries to give him a coin that says number 1 dad and she says i wanted to give you this coin it looks like you love them mare than us.

  8. anonymous
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    Sep 16th 2017 !⃝

    It's a message, to other Niggaz out there. Simple

  9. anonymous
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    Oct 17th 2015 !⃝

    I think this song is about people who went crazy from Eminem's music just like me. When he says the walls are talking. When he says mommy's wrist are bleeding.

    This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
  10. gem_babe1
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    Mar 12th 2014 !⃝

    when my best friends Grandpa died he wouldnt talk to anyone. hes a HUGE Eminem fan so i sent him the chorus to this. i think it means that when you lose someone you love you can mourn for a little bit but dont let it tkae over your world. get on with life like they want you to.

  11. anonymous
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    Nov 1st 2012 !⃝

    i think that eminem wrote this song cause he want ed to tell haillie sorry for not being there for her.

  12. anonymous
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    Aug 25th 2012 !⃝

    I think it's about na. And pills. Just like Iam not afraid song.

    This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
  13. anonymous
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    May 11th 2012 !⃝

    When am gone is not a song for his fans or his daugher, because he(Eminem)loves his daugher and won't want to live her, well I think this song is for the Illuminati becuase in stanza3 the girl told him 'that he should go and show the crowd that he loves them more, he tired to explain but she didn't want to hear his explaination and she said you have made your choice then she left. I think a just used a girl but ironically he has his meaning. LDR

    This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
  14. ShayMarie2014
    click a star to vote
    Mar 15th 2012 !⃝

    Marshall Mathers wrote this song to explain to his daughter why he has to leave. He doesn't necessarily want to go but he knows that he has to. He says that he beat his wife and he did. He says that he isn't leaving his daughter anymore but she knows that he is lying. She knows that her daddy is going again. He wakes up and realizes that he was only dreaming. The fact that he did leave is bothering him because he knows that his daughter needs him. He says that he needs to show love to the people around him before they think that he doesn't love them anymore. In the end, he wakes up from the nightmare, goes outside and kisses Kim. He looks at Laney and Hailey and smiles.

  15. anonymous
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    Nov 9th 2011 !⃝

    i bet you guys feel fucking stupid now dont you saying his career was over. now he brings out 3-4 more albums.

  16. anonymous
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    Aug 4th 2011 !⃝

    The song is about how he keeps neglecting his family so he can be famous. He tries to make it better but shady keeps taking over which is in between the time jumps.

  17. anonymous
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    May 3rd 2011 !⃝

    I think he's saying with all the violence going on between the rappers he wont be here forever and he wants to be with his daughter hailie and that he really cares about her cause when he says he gave a arm for her he actually had a tattoo on his upper right arm of hailie.

  18. Sknikaz
    click a star to vote
    Jan 25th 2011 !⃝

    This song can have a different meaning to all of us. To me it refers to a few family members dying and my grandmother telling me they are always smiling at me from heaven. Also a lot of my friends have, or are, moving away, and when they do, I always have this funny little superstition, that whenever I look up into the night sky, I think that my friends are too, so in a funny way, I still feel close to them. Maybe this is what he meant it to be like. happen. What I mean is, that he probably meant for there to be no real meaning that its meant to be a different meaning for us all.

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