Tetiana Zelinska, a resident of the village of Vablia in the Kyiv region, miraculously survived a direct hit by an enemy shell to her own house. It happened on March 28, 2022, when the village was under occupation. That day, she went inside her house for just a few minutes – and that’s when the shell hit. The woman was covered with debris from the roof and walls. She couldn’t move, she just pulled her hand out from under the rubble, trying to give her husband a sign. He was looking for her among the rubble. Her back was torn: “There was such a hole that you could put half your arm in,” says Tetiana. The entire lower body was injured: her legs, thighs, and shrapnel remained in her tissues. She was bleeding and fainting, but she survived.

Tetiana stayed at home for three days before she could find people who dared to take her through the checkpoints to a hospital in Zhytomyr. Then – Kyiv. 8 complicated surgeries. 2.5 months on the brink. She could not speak, could not walk. “I was like a white wall,” she recalls. But she remembers the hands of strangers pulling her out of the car and saying: “Mother, hold on”. Thanks to Ukrainian doctors, she learned to walk again, although the pain still persists. She was rescued by her husband, neighbours and complete strangers, but family in spirit.