"Kai is waiting to meet the world's best father"
My Alex, my love, It's Tu B'Av today. I'm waiting for you to enter the door with your beautiful smile and the bouquet of flowers you always bring me. What a cruel fate separated us after ten years of being inseparable. You're there, in the darkest place in the universe, and I'm here, In our house, waiting for you, knowing that our love is stronger than anything.
I'd do anything to go get you out of there myself, but my hands are tied, and I'm sure you'd ask me to stay home and look after the boys until you get back. I'm sorry you're still there. You are stronger than anything, and our love is stronger than anything, and we will win.
The boys are fine, Tom keeps talking about you and Kai is looking forward to meeting you. He is waiting to meet the world's best father. And I'm waiting for you, my love, for your warmth, your shoulder, your touch. We never gave up on each other, and just as we swore at the most beautiful wedding in the world to always be there for each other, that's how it will be.
I'm here, surviving for you. Please survive for us, for the beautiful family we started, with so much more ahead of us. Thank you for loving me without limits, I feel it in my bones. I love you more than words can describe. Hold on.
Yours always, Michal
"When you come back our love will only grow stronger"
My booboo, today is Tu B'Av. And we are not people who wait for a special date to celebrate love. We try to live it, appreciate it, choose it and celebrate it every day anew.
It's been 317 days that you've been physically away from me, but my heart remains close to you and with you, closer than ever. I feel you so strongly in every part of my body and heart. I worry about you so much and I feel your pain. And through this pain, I know you even more, and appreciate you and our love more.
Love for me is a choice. So deep and vulnerable, so beautiful and complex, but simple. It is not always easy, but it is home. It is the force that moves us forward even when we are exhausted. And this is the time to hold on to her so tightly and not let go.
My Idan, you are the strongest person I know. I know you're afraid and maybe feel like you can't do it anymore. But I want to tell you that you have the strength to look into the greatest darkness and come out of it stronger. I believe in you and know with all my heart that you find the strength to continue, that you can connect to that inner part of you that knows how to see the light at the end of the tunnel and hold it tight until that light overcomes all the darkness.
Every minute we were together you made me feel at home. I want you to know that I am home to you, and always will be, even when you come back. No matter what, I'm here with you, hand in hand, with everything you bring with you and everything you need. We will go through this journey together. I love your heart, the person you are, the person I am when I'm with you. I promise you that I will be the most solid rock there is for you. I am so looking forward to hugging you and loving you closely again.
When we return to each other after this journey, we will have a new chapter full of depth and greater love than we knew. This lesson will become a gift because we will get to experience life again. Full, satisfying, and closer than ever.
And you will return home, my Idan. I promise you.
"The longing is felt more than ever, but so is the hope"
It's been 317 days that I've been living with the pain and longing for Matan "my beautiful curls." He is not just my partner. He is my other half. Every day that passes without him is a challenge, and every memory we have together is comforting as well as painful.
Together we would love the simple things in life: getting up early in the morning, taking our dog for a walk in the countryside, stopping at a cafe, taking something delicious to go, and continuing together. For us, these small moments were far more than a daily routine. They were the time when we would disconnect from the world and concentrate only on each other.
Our balcony has become a sacred place. Whether it was in the morning, when the sun was just starting to rise, or at the end of the day when we were tired from work and we would sit there with a cup of coffee, talking, dreaming, and making plans. Those were the moments when we felt closest and most connected.
Matan would always smile when I would make him the creamy pasta he loved so much. We would sit together on the sofa, watching a favorite series, but beyond the food or the program it was the feeling of being together, within our routine, that filled us with peace and love.
Since I was released from captivity, the only question that accompanies me all day is "What can be done to bring Matan home?" Every day that passes without him I live in a struggle, a struggle for his life, for my rehabilitation, and for our shared future.
On this Tu B'Av, I strengthen my promise to him, his mother, his amazing sisters, and myself: I will not rest until Matan comes home. Our love strengthens me to keep fighting so that he can return to us, to the place where he belongs.
In this Tu B'Av, the pain and longing are felt more than ever, but also the hope. I keep calling him sweetheart, and my beautiful curls, and imagine the moment when we can sit together on the balcony again, talk, laugh, hug, love, without pain and longing.