I miss my home and miss my air. My native area where I know everything, every corner, and every pathway. I finished school in Shakhtarsk. I worked at the coal mine there for eight years.
I don’t have relatives there. My whole family is my sons Mykyta and Arsen. Other relatives all died. I also miss their graves very much. Why? Because there is no one there who would look after them. I can get there, but going through check-points with kids is a real challenge. 12 hours of travelling and waiting!
I left with a baby under my heart, more than four months of pregnancy at that moment. I left because the shelling lasted five days. It is far from anything pleasant to stay in the basement for five days when the plaster comes off the walls. That is why I left.
What was I to wait for? The hospital did not work and I was pregnant. I stayed in the hospital for pregnancy complications when I was pregnant with my first child. I wanted a second child very much. But nothing worked in the town, people stayed in the basements. The shellfire was very hard. It was scary.
It all started with check-points and with curfew. Then, aircrafts were flying. I was walking down the street and saw two aircrafts flying one after the other. And then a rocket was flying. And you just stand there... I could not even take a picture on my phone because I was shocked. It was shock and fear.
We did not know how to react, what to do, whom to turn to and where to go. We were not ready for that. There came a rumble, an explosion and it all began. And there was a shock. It was scary, not clear. Just horror. What to do, where to run, how to react, whom to turn to, who could help?
Here in Dobropillia, I went to the town council’s executive committee and I was given a room in the hostel. DTEK company fed us – those who lived in the hostel – during the first months. I personally received such aid.
It was difficult to get used to it, to adapt to a new life. We came here and thought that we would leave in a month or two. It was hard to stand the thought of us staying to live here. It was not clear when it would end. This question still torments me: when will it end and when will I go home?
I live, and not a word about home. We live by the present, we live at this moment. Let’s say we have a problem – say, we got sick. We buy a medicine. Everyone thinks about the future, they want to come back home. And to plant vegetable gardens, to live and to go to work at home. But usually, we don’t say a word about home because I cannot be upset. I am a lactating mother, so not a word about home.
I remember the first humanitarian aid. We received it in October and were glad like children on the New Year. Because we were really surviving.
When you realize that someone remembers about you, someone cares about you, you are not left to fend for yourself, that people understand and help and do not leave you on your own. Both Rinat Akhmetov and the Czech organization. No one else helps us, nobody. We have enough well-known names in Ukraine who have wealth and money. Why don't they want to help? I do not understand, but he understands. He understands and he does not leave us.
We have to limit ourselves a lot. Here we adapt. I'm not complaining about anything. I am glad that I have a roof over my head, that I was given it, that I have it.
My child sleeps in the playpen. My older child and I sleep on two beds, separately. I have photos from home, I took them. I just love photos. I didn't think to take some plate, I didn't think to take a pan, but I took the photos. They are dear to me.
Here on our floor, all the tenants are IDPs. We understand each other, help each other, treat each other with some food and share recipes. We complain, we argue and find compromises. We live.
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