WEBVTT - Made with VTT Creator 00:05.887 --> 00:19.701 position:50% align:middle For me, the war began in 2014, because I lived in Luhansk region until 2008. My parents lived in the territory of the now occupied Luhansk region, in the city of Brianka. 00:19.701 --> 00:40.318 position:50% align:middle My father died there in 2014, on September 1. He did not die because of the war, his heart just stopped beating. He was an officer at the time, a lieutenant colonel. 00:40.318 --> 00:50.087 position:50% align:middle He went through two wars – in Chechnya and Afghanistan. My father just died. It was very difficult for me to go there and bury him, because I was from Kyiv region, 00:50.087 --> 01:03.415 position:50% align:middle with a residence registration in Kyiv. It was good that I lived there for a long time, so they knew me there. My husband was very eager to go to war there, to defend Ukraine. 01:03.415 --> 01:14.933 position:50% align:middle He was a sincere patriot, but it so happened that, thank God, he did not go to war then. But on December 8, 2021, he came and said that he had signed a contract 01:14.933 --> 01:29.220 position:50% align:middle and would go to war after all. He just confronted me with the fact. On February 24, I was at work. I worked as a night administrator at "ATB". 01:29.220 --> 01:47.204 position:50% align:middle And we heard the first explosions at work. I called my children and told them to gather quickly all documents. I was one of those people who came to work on February 23 01:47.204 --> 02:00.676 position:50% align:middle and left on February 24. I had spoken Russian until then. I didn't speak a word of Ukrainian at all, I spoke the language of the aggressor all the time. 02:00.676 --> 02:19.593 position:50% align:middle Although I had been volunteering since 2014, for some reason I still spoke Russian. When it affected me directly, I came to the conclusion that it would 02:19.593 --> 02:30.506 position:50% align:middle be a support for my husband, who was... He was in Kyiv region at the time. I have two children: a daughter, who is 16 years old now, and a son, 13 years old. 02:30.506 --> 02:41.494 position:50% align:middle There are also my neighbors, my friends – a husband and a wife. We were in the basement together. And my husband was at war, of course. We stayed there until March 9, 02:41.494 --> 02:52.200 position:50% align:middle and then decided to leave. We were leaving through Mykhailivka-Rubezhivka, there is a turn there, and we left through Berezivka. 02:52.200 --> 03:02.568 position:50% align:middle We were very lucky that there was no shelling when we were leaving. Or rather, there was shelling, but we were stopped by their tank, 03:02.568 --> 03:14.381 position:50% align:middle it did not allow us to drive across Zhytomyr bridge towards Zhytomyr, because there was heavy shelling there. Then we drove over the corpses – literally. 03:14.381 --> 03:24.662 position:50% align:middle We drove around them, and some of them were impossible to drive around. Perhaps it's not worth saying this on camera, but it was very pleasant to drive over the corpses of Russians, 03:24.662 --> 03:36.227 position:50% align:middle to feel the crunch of their bones under the wheels. And you see and realize that these bodies are theirs... Of course, this is perceived very aggressively, because no one invited them here. 03:36.227 --> 03:47.098 position:50% align:middle We went to Cherkasy region to the mother of [my] friend. We stayed there until May and then returned home. 03:47.098 --> 04:04.475 position:50% align:middle My husband was first in Velyka Dymerka, then they went to Sumy region, chased the Russians through Sumy region to Kharkiv region. They assaulted Kutuzivka. 04:04.475 --> 04:16.977 position:50% align:middle I think you have heard of this village in Kharkiv region. My husband's unit assaulted it. Then they went to Donbas. He got his first injury in Donbas. He came home. 04:16.977 --> 04:29.990 position:50% align:middle He was so injured that he could have been discharged, but he came back. He said: "I will be with my guys. How can they be fighting there while I'm sitting at home?" 04:29.990 --> 04:43.082 position:50% align:middle The only thing he said was that when they were in Sumy, Kharkiv and Kyiv regions, they fought for people, but in Donbas they fought for territory. 04:43.082 --> 04:57.136 position:50% align:middle Why? Because as soon as they arrived there with their equipment, people came out to them, and even spoke Ukrainian, and half an hour later there was a hit at the place where they had come. 04:57.136 --> 05:09.741 position:50% align:middle The soldiers just went to different places. Some spent the night in the basement, others drove to the field. They smiled to you, and then gave up their positions, 05:09.741 --> 05:24.829 position:50% align:middle and our guys were under attack. I was driving a car to Kherson region, and we stopped in one town. I was driving a camouflage car. A soldier was accompanying me. 05:24.829 --> 05:37.024 position:50% align:middle And 15 minutes later, we were just drinking coffee, and my sworn brother said to me: "Let's get out of here, we have to run away". 05:37.024 --> 05:52.666 position:50% align:middle We left and the place started to be shelled. It was really scary, to be honest. After being wounded, my husband returned to his position, and three days later he died. 05:52.666 --> 06:07.242 position:50% align:middle His sworn brothers told me that he was gone. On September 1, 2022, my husband was killed in the war in Donetsk region near Novopavlivka. The war is not over for me. 06:07.242 --> 06:19.148 position:50% align:middle I help his sworn brothers. My husband was a unit commander, and I help the guys who are left – and there are not many of them left – as much as I can. 06:19.148 --> 06:30.038 position:50% align:middle We gather something, transport it, drive [vehicles]. We help as much as we can. The daughter still feels very hard, although she can at least talk about it. 06:30.038 --> 06:44.115 position:50% align:middle We had an interview for the Rada TV channel, and she was the only one who agreed to talk about her father. And my son... Although from the first minute he found out, 06:44.112 --> 06:53.591 position:50% align:middle he first cried, and then he saw that I was all black, and he started to calm me down: "Mom, calm down. There are three of us, we have to help each other". 06:53.591 --> 07:04.857 position:50% align:middle That is, he turned a man inside him, even though he was only 12 years old at that time. My daughter is working with a psychologist on this issue. I also started talking to a psychologist here 07:04.857 --> 07:14.568 position:50% align:middle because, as it turned out, I couldn't let my husband go. For a year, I have never said that he was dead. I only said "my husband". 07:14.568 --> 07:23.960 position:50% align:middle And I have never focused on this, but the psychologist pointed out to me that I was not letting him go.