IDF war widow pens letter to Valerie Barham

The chairwoman of the IDF widows and orphans organization, who lost her husband in the First Lebanon War, pens a letter to Valerie Braham, whose husband Phillipe was killed in the Paris supermarket attack.

Nava Shoham Solan writes: “From my experience – the experience of a woman who lost her husband at such a young age, and was left with two small children – I can only say two words to you: slowly, slowly. That is the sentence that I say to every widow whose world was suddenly destroyed. You will see – as I also did, even though there were moments in which it was difficult to believe – that other days will come, better days. Slowly, slowly gather the pieces, the pieces of your life and for their sake – glue them together, piece by piece.

“True, he will always be missing and he will always come back with the storms of longing, but slowly, slowly you will learn to live with him, he who is there but is not, who is present but is missing so much, who died but always lives in the heart. Believe me – it happens. It happened to many of my friends in the organization. What appears to be utter darkness now will be light that will shine from within the memorial candle and from within the tears, from within the eyes of the children, and from within the picture framed in black. What now seems weak and broken will become armor and steel.”