One day it just happened. It's creepy to remember now.
I was really nervous the week before. My daughter was asking to go somewhere and I didn't know what to do. Then, I started getting calls from people asking if I knew anywhere that was still open. Suddenly, the prices for renting an apartment went up a lot. So I called my friend in Spain and asked for help. She said that the prices had gone up unrealistically and that people were panicking. Another interesting moment happened on the 23rd. I came to work and people who worked next to me were talking about it. One of the girls said that she had a man from SBU with her and that nothing would happen. Maria said not to worry, everything is fine. But I wasn't comforted by their words at all and I came home feeling alarmed. At 4 am, I heard the sound of sirens and saw the glow of lights through my window. I live between Zhulyany and Boryspil. Everyone got up and we began running around the apartment. I was shaking and the youngest was asleep. The older daughter also reacted adequately and began to search the apartment with a flashlight. We did not believe it until the last moment. These explosions were crazy.
I was in a hurry and I didn't know what to take with me. I was stressed out. We had to leave early in the morning and we were trying to pack the car. Then my child said, "Mom, there's a declared martial law. No one can go anywhere." Although a lot of people were still going out, we stopped and went to the basement. We spent the day there with other people from our house. It was a nice place and everything was fine down there. I brought some canned food just in case it might be useful. If it's not useful, we'll throw it away.
We sat for a whole day. The optimists said it was all nonsense and that we would be able to get out. But I made soup the day before and told the children to come and I would feed them. They came home, but they still had a little snack, they had their own plans in terms of how to get out. I have not said anything yet. I remember with a laugh. We cooked three liters of buckwheat porridge. I said what for, they said we would eat it on the road. I was with my dog and we did not eat anything.
It took us three days to get to the border. We weren't going abroad, we were going to western Ukraine. We had a place to stay there. I packed some things and moved out the next day. In the morning, I went to my office and got my tools. Then we left. It looked like a gypsy camp when we started driving out. There were people running down the street, asking to come with us, but our car was full.
My daughter knows all the roads well. She races car raceю We drove fast, through a lot of checkpoints, and arrived at night. My daughter called her acquaintances in Khmelnitsky to spend the night. They met us and helped each other. The guy was building his hotel and it wasn't quite finished, but we came anyway. I thought we were safe when we got there because it was a long way from Kiev. We relaxed a little, there were a few cars, and we drove in a group. Then I went into the bathroom and an explosion happened. I fell on the floor.

I told everyone to lie down and turned off the light. We ate dinner and I forbade everyone to walk or do anything. This was the first time in my life I slept with my clothes on and my boots on. We slept on the floor so we wouldn't be on high ground. No one slept because we were all scared. In the morning, we got ready and drove out of there. We got a call from someone we knew who said to go to Greece. The daughter said all right, but I and my mom with my sister and dog, all right, we'll all go together.
At first, everyone was helping each other. But then things changed. We went to the Romanian border and we thought we would have to wait there for three or four days. People who were walking were allowed through much faster. We had no chance of getting through. So we decided to go to another border. People gave us a hint and we crossed the other border in about an hour and a half. Then we crossed into Moldova.
I have a photo of some people at the border who were getting ready to eat. I was too shy to go up and talk to them, but I could see that they were sitting in their car, all locked up. Someone was knocking on the car. Then I went over to these women and asked why they were doing that and they said they didn't want us to have a war. They were defending themselves in such a simple way, but I was very moved by it. I cried and took a picture of them. They were standing there the whole time we were there, even though we ran out of food and other people were coming.
We moved to Romania, but I couldn't sleep. I didn't sleep at all for two or three months and I couldn't believe what was going on. Then we moved to Bulgaria, then Greece. We drove in the car and stayed in hotels for a long time. In Greece, it wasn't possible to sit down, so we decided to move on. The eldest daughter wanted to go to England, so we came to Italy and looked for options on how to get to England with my youngest daughter.
This is how I'm solving the issue, but I still have a dog that I need to finalize just to have it. I told everyone that I never leave mine and all should be with me. The baby (dog) of course suffered a lot on the road. In general, it was completely blind. The dog also got crazy stress, despite the fact that the adult was with me. It turns out we were in Italy for about a month. We stayed with a great soul--the former American model. She and her husband bought a castle in Spain and they lived in Hollywood. And the Ukrainians were given accommodations there. We were together in France for a long time, so we had to get the dog's paperwork transferred. I'm still having a hard time with it. I watch the news and get upset all the time. I can't sleep well, and I'm always tired. It feels like everything has changed, even though we try to act like everything is normal. I'm sorry for all the time we've lost. It feels like my life is over, and I've lost everything. My eldest daughter lives in London, and my youngest went away. I'm very lonely and sad. But I'm grateful to England for being responsive during this difficult time. I'm not confident in my English skills and that makes me feel uneasy. When we first arrived here with my daughter, I felt like I could finally breathe again and be honest. It felt like coming home. But then we started having our own problems and I realized that's just life. I understand that it's just a part of life, but the pain of loss and everything that happened to us will never go away. She'll always be with us even when we're gone.
What does Ukraine mean to you today?
I'm grateful to our President for not leaving. I don't know how it happened, but someone was meant to stay and someone was meant to leave. I still can't understand why it happened to me. Maybe I could have stayed, but the circumstances were such that I left.But I don't like when other people who also left are condemned.
I am afraid to go home because of what I have seen. I have seen people who have lost their homes and defenseless animals. It is just cruel. How can they do this?
What was Ukraine like before the war?

It was a home where everything was good. There were good people, comfort, and stability. People had good jobs. It was everything a normal person needs to live.

But now, after the war, things are different. People say it all comes in comparison. When you're at home, within your walls, you feel safe. But when everything is ruined, you don't have anywhere to go or anything to do.

I started hearing rumors about the war in January. Some of my clients closed therapy and left. They called me and told me to get ready to leave, but I refused to believe that... how they would get to Kyiv so quickly, so I was going to leave. I had a busy schedule, I started working that year on January 1, January 1 there was a very wonderful group already at home, so during my working hours I did not give myself the opportunity to sit down and think about it specifically, but I started saving money in papers, I collected all the documents and started packing.
On February 24, someone knocked on my window and told me to wake up. They said that the war had started. I was on vacation that day and I had turned off all my phones. We were going to go to VDNKh. I didn't know what to do. But like many Ukrainian women, I went to the shower to wash my hair until my son woke up. It was clear that I had to leave. For me, there was no question of whether or not to go--I knew I had to go. My grandmother was a child of war and even though the war was over everywhere else, it remained in her soul. In order to protect her mental health and the mental health of her child, she had to go. There are some traumas that cannot be treated--they stay with a person for their whole life.
I packed my things, but I couldn't leave. I had a bad feeling and couldn't drive. I called to cancel the tickets. Everyone was asking me what I was doing. I exhaled and remembered another friend who was also sitting on her suitcases. We agreed and went together. That's how this year went.
It was very hard to leave my home. I felt better after I left. Then I decided to go to England. I worked hard to figure out where to go and how to get there. I have been here for 8 months trying to figure out how to live. In Ukraine, I had my home, my job, and two degrees. Here my degrees are not valid, no one needs my job, I have no apartment, and no place to live. Unskilled labor will not pay for everything I need. For this year, there is a long list of things I can't do because I have a son. It has been a long year with a lot of help from other people, but few results.
What does Ukraine mean to you now?
For me, it is a closed home, lost friends, and some of them are buried there. I cannot return and my career is ruined. I've already been in immigration and my son was born in Italy. I consciously returned to Ukraine 10 years ago because I appreciate what it has given me. But I don't know if I will be able to go back again.

The story is not finished. It will be written in full when the war is over.

At 5:05 a.m., we heard five explosions. They were getting closer and closer, and you could hear them in the windows. There was no question what was happening. The sound can't be confused with anything else—it's a swift explosion, followed by a shaking of the ground and the windows.

I picked up my youngest daughter (who was six months old at the time) and woke up my oldest daughter, wondering if she was still going to school today. My husband went upstairs to the second floor of our house, looked out the window, then came downstairs and said it was burning—I don't know how to say it correctly. It wasn't a military unit; it was a small unit, probably what we now call air defense. It was a couple kilometers away from us. A few days before that, there were a lot of cars there. I want to believe that nobody was there when it started.
We went down to the basement. It is a nice big basement. We didn't see anything at first, but then my husband went to check it out. I asked him not to go, but he did anyway. I called a friend who lives near the military unit. She said they were packing and going to leave soon. I know they took the children's papers and left a few days after I called. The first days their house was completely destroyed. We were in the basement for the first day, I even have photos of the children, and our neighbors came to us with their old houses, and we had newer ones, and they came to ask for at least enough room for the children.
We all spent the night together. I don't remember who told us to leave, because of this military unit that was on fire right away we had nowhere to go, we had the road to Belgorod and this side of the military unit and that was it. We spent a whole day getting out, when it got quieter, my husband went into town to get some food. To his surprise there were no queues and no panic. He picked up some groceries, took my nephew to our place from the city (Kharkiv).
I was not sure that the first week would last long. It was a feeling. A modern man cannot imagine just standing tanks and shooting at a city of millions. We spent the first night in the basement with the children. Wooden planking was brought in for us. There were more than 10 of us. Four days later we decided to leave because we heard machine gun shots outside our door. Our house is closer to the highway than Kiev, which they were going to reach in three days. My husband came back when he went to buy food and said there was no bridge anymore.
We all slept in the basement. We heard everything that happened upstairs. We boarded up the windows and turned off the lights. We didn't need to be told about keeping the light camouflage mode. When have flying over the roof you automatically turn everything off. We even went out into the yard, it's a private sector. Neighbors came in and said the little bridge we had to drive over was blocked by a Grad rocket launcher, now it's lying there just didn't fit in the corner. We got up with a clear understanding that here at night on our streets by our houses drove heavy tanks and Grad, After four days, cut off the power, heating is all related to electricity and we were left without electricity.
It was -20 degrees outside, and they turned on the generator. But it's scary when there's shooting going on and you're here with a generator that roars like a tractor. Then the electricity was turned on for one day, but then it was turned off again. And the relatives came to the neighbors and said that the crew that tried to fix the substation had been shot. We realized that we had to leave, but we were worried that the children would get cold and sick. I began to call my friends and colleagues and ask for information about what was going on in general, but we didn't know anything because there was practically no communication. We could go up to the attic to make a call, but all we could hear were shots from different directions. My mother learned to distinguish the sound of planes and rockets, but communication was only with the relatives.
I called my colleagues who work with the regional authorities and asked them when we could leave. I also called groups of volunteers. I wrote to the Kraken group and they wrote back to me. The heads of the region told me that I could leave at my own risk. So we packed our bags and were going to leave for a couple of weeks. We packed two bags, one of which was completely full of my youngest daughter's things. On February 23rd, my husband was picking up his daughter from school and came home in the evening and said he had filled up my car with gas. He had never filled up my car before. There must have been some conversations and he just decided it was a dealI called my colleagues who work with the regional authorities and asked them when we could leave. I also called groups of volunteers. I wrote to the Kraken group and they wrote back to me. The heads of the region told me that I could leave at my own risk. So we packed our bags and were going to leave for a couple of weeks. We packed two bags, one of which was completely full of my youngest daughter's things. On February 23rd, my husband was picking up his daughter from school and came home in the evening and said he had filled up my car with gas. He had never filled up my car before. There must have been some conversations and he just decided it was a did.
We were ready to go on March 4, but then the shelling began. We drove the car outside and loaded it up, then I went to my neighbors to cook. A neighbor came up and said that he had just arrived from town, and that it was possible to pass on the highway. So we gathered everything in 15 minutes and left. In the car were me, my eldest daughter, my mother, my youngest in my arms, and my nephew. Later I was asked how I could leave my husband behind. I only thought of saving my children. My husband hugged me and said if it was possible to go abroad before we left. I thought that maybe I would never see him again... So we left on March 4th and drove to Poltava a day later.
We were driving in our car and we got stopped by some people who had put up roadblocks. We were annoyed because it was taking forever to get through all the small villages. By the time we got to Poltava, our friends who left earlier had already called us. We decided to leave two days later and drove for 10 hours straight. I was driving and feeding the baby at the same time. When we left Kharkiv, there was shooting from the side of the road. My eldest daughter asked what it was, and I said it was the snow falling on the road from the car.
On the highway, there were a lot of wrecked and burnt-out equipment and trailers. It was our way of life. The worst part was when we had to leave. We tied white rags to the mirrors of our car. A volunteer was driving in front of us. He overtook our car and stopped. He said that we would be shot faster if we kept the rags on the car. So we took them off. Now I have these rags as towels in the kitchen. We got to Lviv on March 8 at 7 pm. On the ninth, my husband called and said that Russian troops had entered our village, which is near Kharkov. He said that there is no end in sight and we have to leave immediately and go abroad because Russian troops are only 4 kilometers away from Kharkov.
There were a lot of Russian soldiers who came and checked people's phones. They said that anyone who wanted to leave could go to Belgorod, but they didn't know what would happen to the people who stayed. My husband didn't want to leave because he loved Crimea, so we stayed. But then the soldiers closed all the exits and we didn't know what would happen next. We left for Poland the next day and our relative there promised to help us, but as soon as we crossed the border she stopped talking to us. It seemed like everything was falling apart. I was still working at that point.
I was working for a Danish company, and I knew that my colleagues would help me if I needed it. So I called one of them and asked for help. I told her that I was with my children and my mother, and we needed somewhere to go. She told me that she had found a family who was willing to take us in. So we went to their house. They were a very kind family, and we still keep in touch with them. They helped us with everything they could. The first thing the landlady did was take me to a clothing store so I could buy some new clothes. She paid for our clothes, groceries, and everything else we needed.
I went back to work and they gave us a small house to live in. It was her mother's former home. At first, they were very worried we were scammers. There were a lot of people like us who came to this country and they realized we were normal, so they let us live in the house. I understood that my work and salary would not allow us to move forward, so I called a very distant relative from England who I had never seen before. She said she really wanted to help us and she told me about a visa program for Ukrainians.
I wasn't sure if we should go at first, but I decided to get a visa. My husband was supportive. On May 1, it was my birthday on April 30, and on April 30 Ukrainian troops liberated our village. We communicated from time to time, a couple of times a week. He said they were liberated but not yet allowed to go out, and in a couple of days he was allowed to go out. He was there helping his neighbors. But he told us to no go back, there was nowhere to go back to, even though the house was still standing, but everyone had left the settlement, and there was no one left, not even animals. My children have nothing to do here, the school and the kindergarten are ruined, the whole town is shot up, even though there are some buildings, but there is no life for children here. We received the visa in a month and decided to move here with our relatives. Then I understood that there was nothing to do here without a job so I found one.
I am an engineer who calculates and tests the strength of various structures from aircraft to bridges. I have fifteen years of experience. The place where I now work was one of the first firms where I applied my resume. But there were unpleasant moments when one of the firms responded the next morning and offered me a salary that was for a university graduate, not for a specialist with fifteen years of experience.
The company wanted to get me, so I offered to work for them for three months. Then we would review the conditions. They did not agree, so I got a very good offer from another company. But I had to move here. We came four times by car. The first time we only had two bags. The second time we moved everything in one car. The third time we drove more than one car and had to pack everything up. And when they asked us to open the trunk at the border, I said I would open it and you could catch the diapers. We have moved four times and each time we have one a car. We are now settled and cannot move again. One car is not enough.
What does Ukraine mean to you now?
I'm afraid of my own thoughts. I don't think we will go back to Ukraine, and I don't want to think about it. I stopped doing that since February 24. I don't plan anything more than a week in advance now, and even that is a big progress.
No plans. We now miss and in general miss but I understand that we miss then in Ukraine no longer. We miss our memories.My husband says that it takes at least two more years after it is over for something to recover to live normally in Kharkiv. This is about those territories where the war was fought. Unfortunately, I began to divide the parts in which there was fighting and in which they did not pass. This is a different life, people can not understand what they have not experienced. I read some article, some psychologist, that you can't blame them for this lack of understanding. I think a lot of people will go back to Ukraine, but if it's at least two more years then some kind of life will be set up.
My daughter is more or less used to school, but the younger one won't know anything except England. I don't think we'll give up everything we've built, so for today -  Ukraine it's a memory.

I didn't sleep that night. I was sitting in the kitchen when I heard fighter planes flying overhead. That's when I realized the war had begun. Why did we all talk about war? And we hoped to the last minute that it would pass us by. But here I was, very worried about my family-for their sake and for their children's sake. I was ready to go and save myself because I had a premonition that something bad was going to happen. Literally, the war began at 5 in the morning when my child ran out of the bedroom crying and said, "Mom, there's a war." My husband couldn't believe it at first. He just sat in front of the TV in a state of shock.
I knew I had to act fast, so the same day we were running around Kiev buying food, we got ready to leave. A year ago, my mom bought a small house in the countryside, and we went to the village. We were able to get out because there was a lot of panic and people were everywhere trying to get gas and buy food. We were lucky because there was a small grocery store near our house and we were able to buy everything we needed. On the 24th, we left with our pet dog and cat. Only my husband and mother stayed behind. Mom was working. My mother took care of a sick woman who could not leave her bed for the first month of the war. She stayed with her all the time, but unfortunately the woman still died. This had a negative impact on my mother's health too, and she had to go to the clinic.
That year was a turning point in my life.
We were in Poland for two months, but we thought about going further because it's not safe anyway. And to go wherever the country suits me, which is fine for me. It would be comfortable for me, for the education of my children, for some development, and where there would still be a good program for help. And there was a program of England, made a program and we quickly literally in ten days made visas. Meanwhile we even went to see Austria, I just wanted to give the children some positive emotions my mother gave us her savings so we could see the world, we were in Paris. The world has opened up for the Ukrainians a lot of opportunities for travel such as self-fulfillment appeared more opportunities.
At 17, I became a housewife. Before that, I worked as an advertising manager for 10 years. But when I moved here, I couldn't work in my profession. Now I work as a housekeeper at the Hilton. I was warned that it is physically hard, but it was very hard the first two weeks. However, we have a very friendly team-- international team of Ukraine, Moldova, Romania. In general, I like the fact that England is a very international country with lots of nationalities. Everyone can find himself here and no one is oppressed. At the first English lesson we were told that everyone is supported equally. Now I think the older girl went to a good school  even though the education is very expensive, but they help the Ukrainians.
I think I was asleep before, and then I woke up. In Ukraine, my health was really bad. I went to the hospital seven times. But here I'm doing great. I'm not on my own though. I believed in God to help me and felt His power. And I believed in myself that I would succeed. Maybe this is a chance to learn something and not let go of the past. Now, Ukraine is a place that I love and England is too.
I looked at my country, Ukraine, from a different perspective. I think it is probably the strongest country in the world. This is thanks to the President and his whole team. If you say that you are from Ukraine, people will respect you and open doors for you.