"I was sure he would get up and leave": Adi Atzmi's moving confession
Adi Atzmi tells about her complex childhood in Jerusalem, the fear of abandonment that followed her into her relationship with Or Ohana, and the anxieties of abandonment.
Behind the photogenic pictures on social media and the smiles of the "Race to the Million" finale, lies a complex story of overcoming, building trust, and dismantling the baggage of the past. For Adi Atzmi, the path to creating a stable family unit alongside her husband, Or Ohana, was not a given; it required her to break free from past patterns and learn to trust again.
To understand the couple's dynamic, one must return to Adi's childhood. As the eldest daughter in a home in Jerusalem, at age 15 she experienced a severe family and financial crisis following her father's business complications, which ultimately led to her parents' divorce. Adi was forced to take on a parental role, care for her sisters, manage the house, and even function as a mediator between her parents in an atmosphere filled with tension.
This experience, alongside the complex struggle with her younger sister who suffered from clinical depression, formed in her a deep fear of abandonment and rigid defense mechanisms. "I became a parent-child against my will," she testified in the past.
The anxieties and mental fear of abandonment accompanied Adi into her adulthood and entered her relationship with Or. At every moment of disagreement or argument, her automatic defense mechanism shifted to the only solution she knew — to run away first before she could be abandoned.
At this breaking point, the moment arrived that changed her worldview regarding the relationship:
"There was always a fear in me that they would get up and leave me, so after every fight I would get up and leave... until one day Or said to me, 'No matter what happens here inside the house, we don't leave. We deal with it.' When he said that sentence to me, I knew this was the man I wanted to live with."
This statement by Or gave Adi the security she was missing. She realized she had a partner in front of her who would not give up at the first moment of difficulty. Despite the couple's understanding, the baggage from the past did not disappear in one day. Adi says that precisely after the marriage proposal from Or, at a moment that was supposed to be the happiest of her life, her body reacted with severe anxiety attacks and hair loss.
This physical reaction led her to seek therapy at the age of 28. The therapy allowed her to release anger, learn to accept criticism without attacking, and manage the relationship from a place of understanding rather than ego.
As viewers of "Race to the Million" saw, the relationship between Or and Adi was not characterized by the presentation of a perfect or fake image, but by hard work, acceptance, and open communication. Adi even shared in the past that on her Instagram page she chose to present the domestic fights as well, not just the beautiful moments:
"I am not coming to paint a perfect relationship now. There are many things that bother me and him too... but in the end, we choose to work on it."
Today, as they are parents to two daughters, maintaining successful careers and a joint brand, the journey of the two proves that a strong relationship is not the result of an absence of difficulties but of the joint decision to stay, to deal with it, and not to leave.
