Rayya Elias, the partner of Eat, Pray, Love author Elizabeth Gilbert, has died.
Gilbert announced Elias, who was diagnosed with pancreatic and liver cancer in 2016, has passed away in a statement posted on social media on Friday afternoon.
"I loved you so much, Rayya," Gilbert wrote on Instagram. "Thank you for letting me walk with you right to the edge of the river. It has been the greatest honour of my life."
She added, "I would tell you to rest in peace, but I know that you always found peace boring. May you rest in excitement. I will always love you."
Gilbert and Syrian-born, US-raised Elias had been close friends for over 15 years.
They announced their romantic relationship to the public in September 2016, following Gilbert's divorce from her Brazilian-Australian importer husband Jose Nunes. At the time, Gilbert said Elias' cancer diagnosis had played a large role in bringing the women together romantically.
"Something happened to my heart and mind in the days and weeks following Rayya's diagnosis," Gilbert shared with her 1.7 million Facebook followers. "Death ??? or the prospect of death ??? has a way of clearing away everything that is not real, and in that space of stark and utter realness, I was faced with this truth: I do not merely love Rayya; I am in love with Rayya."
The couple celebrated their love with a commitment ceremony in June 2017.
Elias was an author, songwriter and short filmmaker, and had previously worked as a hairdresser. She met Gilbert when she came in for a haircut.
Her 2013 memoir, Harley Loco: A memoir of hard living, hair and post-punk, detailed her life as a gay Middle Eastern woman whose family moved to the US aged eight, candidly recounting her time as a homeless woman, prison inmate and drug addict.
Speaking to Fairfax Media in 2015, Gilbert explained the depths of their friendship.
"There are things in the world I just can't solve, that broke me," she said, addressing Elias. "And I don't know why and I don't know how to not do that again. And you have pieces of that puzzle."
