Russian aggression hits the most vulnerable Ukrainians the hardest. People who had a hard time even before the war, during the war overcome difficulties that the civilized world knows only from history books. War is quite a challenge for all families, but what is it like when you have a child with disability? Then you can’t do without outside help. Public organizations and individual volunteers become saviors in the true sense of the word.
Olha Tsilynko survived the occupation of Kherson and continues living in the city under fire. More than two dozen families with children with disabilities are under her care. The Sofia Family Rehabilitation Center, headed by Olha, has been active for 15 years, and all this time the organization has been supporting families that have children with central nervous system disorders. Today, when Kherson is under Russian shelling around the clock, Olha keeps supporting her people.
During the last few years, before the big war, the families of the NGO “Sofia Family Rehabilitation Center” could have a short vacation and rehabilitation at the sea in the Kherson region. This was provided at the expense of the city budget. So children whose families do not have enough money for full-fledged vacation and rehabilitation could go to the Black Sea coast every year to recuperate and undergo rehabilitation.
With the occupation of Kherson in 2022, the rehabilitation of children with disabilities was suspended, as was a whole series of activities for them. However, Olha couldn’t afford to “put her families on hold” either. The heroine says they are hers, because since joining the organization, the families have really become one family, and the “friend or foe” identification has become very important during the occupation and Russian shelling that has been going on since the first days of the full-scale invasion. Olha calls her families “Sofiykas”.
“During the occupation, it was important for me that no one went to the Russians for a “humanitarian aid”
At the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Kherson region was one of those where the invaders advanced the fastest. In the end, almost the entire region, including the regional center, was under occupation. In Kherson, the panic was about the same as in other communities: drugs disappeared from pharmacy shelves and food from store shelves. It was difficult to withdraw money from ATMs. As the occupation deepened, it became more difficult not only to get cash, but also to pay by card: at a certain stage, the Russians began to control the use of terminals and actively “seized” them – that’s what they called the actual theft.
“During the occupation, it was important for me that no one went to the Russians for “humanitarian aid,” says Olha Tsilynko. “Let’s be honest: in most of my families, mothers support children on their own – without fathers. Unfortunately, these are the realities. A mother raising a child with a disability cannot work full-time either. The occupation of Kherson has also stopped the usual and full-fledged work processes – many people have lost their jobs and earnings. My mothers are practically on the verge of survival. In addition, alimony was not transferred either. This is what probably surprises me most in the occupation: mothers of children with disabilities did not receive alimony for almost a year from the beginning of the occupation. How were they supposed to live?”
Olha emphasized: she was perfectly aware that the occupation would begin with the Russians distributing “humanitarian aid” and filming it for propaganda. Having a degree in history and being a long-term volunteer, Olha Tsilynko recalls that it was exactly what happened in Crimea and in the occupied communities of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in 2014. After the occupation began, she kept appealing to caring people on social media to help financially. The money was used to buy food and drugs.
Children with disabilities need medicines constantly to maintain their vital functions. Pharmacies closed very quickly, the almost forgotten Soviet word “get” reappeared in everyday life, the woman recalls: “Medicines could be ordered and paid for from familiar volunteers, some of whom were in the Ukrainian government-controlled area. And they tried to take them to Kherson at the risk of their lives. The Russians did not always let them through. There were cases when volunteers were taken prisoner; some were killed by Russians at checkpoints. Sometimes cargo was simply stolen. It was such a scary time…”
Not all medicines could be “got”. “The de-occupation of Kherson saved a lot: one of the first things we did was to buy and deliver the medicines that the children needed so much,” says Olha. “None of the families went to get Russian ‘humanitarian aid’.”
Shelling and blowing up of the Kakhovka HPP: whatever happens, it’s good that there are no Russians
You can see Olha Tsilynko in various photographs that went around the world in the first days of Kherson’s de-occupation in November 2022. Together, the families she takes care of celebrated the liberation from the Russians. Together, they survive shelling. Together, they overcame another disaster – when the Russians blew up the Kakhovka HPP.
Olha’s house was located near the river, so the water started to fill it in the first hours after the Kakhovka HPP was blown up, she says: The only thing separating us from the river was the rails – they are slightly higher than the river level. The water was not supposed to reach us – the rails remained completely dry. But there were storm drains under them. They were not closed. In 15 minutes, the stream moved 40 meters. The speed was very high.”
On that day, June 6, 2023, from 7 a.m., when people already realized that the water was rushing towards them, they started calling the emergency services, but they could do little to help. The Russians had stolen almost all the equipment during the occupation.
Olha’s house is now uninhabitable. After the Russians blew up the Kakhovka HPP, a lot of silt, dirt, unexploded mines, and other things flowed down with the water. The woman didn’t even have time to take a photo right away, but later her friends reminded her that she would need it for further evidence and possible compensation: “I hardly had time to take anything away. We were busy helping elderly neighbors and rescuing animals. A lot of documents and important things were destroyed. Our life before June 6, 2023 was erased by the Russians, but we started to live again. The whole town did.”
For some time, Olha lived with her daughter, son and animals in the premises of the NGO. In fact, the Center – as the “Sofiykas” call it – became a real salvation. Volunteer friends donated new sets of linen so that the children could sleep comfortably. Caring people raised money to support a volunteer who had saved three dozen families during the entire occupation and now needed help herself.
“The shock and despair was awful. But whatever happens, it’s good that there are no Russians,” emphasizes Olha Tsilynko.
We are waiting for our sea
After a two-year break, the families of the “Sofia” center were once again able to provide children with disabilities with a short rehabilitative vacation. For the first time, it was not at the sea, but in a new area – in the Ternopil region.
“This is a real breath of fresh air for families, literally and figuratively,” says Olha Tsilynko. “After the terrible realities of round-the-clock shelling, there’s a bit of silence in the comfort of the trees, with rehabilitation exercises, classes with a psychologist. It is very important for our children. Of course, we are waiting for our sea – the de-occupation of the Kherson region, but this rehabilitation was also very important to us.”
Olha continues helping families: they still have weekly sessions with a psychologist; volunteers help with money for food. Olha continues buying dairy products, which are necessary for sick children. If there’s an opportunity to buy seasonal fruit, she also takes advantage of it.
Recently, a farmer from the Beryslav district, Anatoliy Polyvyanyi, made a gift for the children. Olha helped him with planting material, and Anatoliy thanked her with a generous harvest of vegetables. And all this – under round-the-clock Russian shelling, which doesn’t seem to stop, not even for a moment.
“We delivered aid for our military,” says Olha. “We have to help those who liberated us and are now defending us from the Russians. On the way, we stopped at Anatoliy’s. It was terrible to see how the Russians mutilated those incredible communities in the Kherson region. Devastated broken villages. In larger villages, there is still life, but in small ones everything is very sad. They destroyed an entire layer of our culture: uprooted it. There is very little agricultural machinery, but the fields are cultivated – a purely Ukrainian feature, our farmers will be able to cultivate the land everywhere, even without machinery… The heat and lack of irrigation made the sunflowers die at the “head as fist” stage. The reservoirs that we still saw in November have either disappeared or shrunk beyond recognition.”
Today, Russian reconnaissance drones with explosives are reaching even the center of Kherson. They are literally hunting for people. The Russians are firing from almost all types of weapons they have. Every day, there are reports of wounded and deaths are not uncommon. However, the city continues living: “Everyone who stays in Kherson is, in fact, a volunteer. We unite, help each other, know who is a friend and who is a foe — that’s how we survived, and that’s how we will continue to live,” says Olha.
Author: Yevheniia Virlych
*All photos courtesy of the author
Supported by the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine. The views of the authors do not necessarily reflect the official position of the U.S. Government.