The ninth day. Seems like time has stopped. During these days I went through all the stages of grief.
On the first day, there was a stage of denial. It lasted for several hours. I did not believe that all these explosions were our new reality, that a Facebook feed with messages from friends with the word "war" was not a nightmare.
And then came the stage of anger. In 2014, I was terribly afraid for my parents who stayed in Luhansk and hated Russia, which started the war. In 2022, I still hate the invaders, but I am already afraid for my son. My son is a little boy who is three years old. He wrinkles his nose funnily, snorts in his sleep, repeats everything he hears and laughs so loudly and sincerely that my heart melts. Most of all in the world, I like to hug him and inhale the smell of his curly hair. He is my third pregnancy. I can't say with words how dear he is to me, how much I love him!
On the second day of the war, he almost stopped talking and smiling and began to cry in his sleep. My heart breaks and bursts with pain.
On the third day, I reached the stage of bargaining or compromise. I had imaginary conversations while lying without sleep - what and how I can do to change something. I wrote to my acquaintances, trying to convince them that there was in fact a war in Ukraine, that no one mistook a window view for a TV picture. It turned out that convincing indifferent people is quite a hard toil. So I stopped wasting energy and switched to much more useful work. I drew a pattern for embroidery and shared it. And it worked, the blue-yellow heart attracted the attention of more than five thousand girls. Women from the Czech Republic, Poland, Ukraine, Spain, Brazil, Hungary and other countries embroider it, thus drawing attention to the events in our country. I am incredibly grateful to everyone who supports us in this difficult time.
The stage of depression flashed yesterday when negotiations did not stop the war but proceeded to the third round.
And then came the stage of acceptance - together with the reflections on how to live. The night was very difficult and stressful for all of us. I watched the video of the fire - like all of you probably did - and was afraid that the story of 1986 could be repeated.
All these days, I have been praying. For my family, friends, acquaintances, for the country, for our soldiers. I'm not a believer, but my grandmother prayed to protect me, my mother prays now, and that's what I do.
God, give us the strength and patience to go through this and see Ukraine as
a peaceful, beautiful and happy country again!
Ukrainian Text by Tatiana Pin. Translated into English by Ukrainianvancouver team – Mar 20. 2022
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