Ksenia's story

Words from Ksenia:

“I’m from Kharkiv [North East Ukraine]. We lived in one apartment - my grandmother, my mom, my younger brother, and me. I never knew my father, he left my mom when she was pregnant. So, the four of us lived together. I went to the same school as my brother. My teenage years were pretty normal, like most kids. 

Around 2017, my mom started drinking heavily. That, along with a few other factors, led to her losing her parental rights. By 2021, we had the official status of ‘children deprived of parental care’ and we lived in temporary residential facility. This is a place where kids stay until their situation with their parents is resolved. We were then placed with a foster family under guardianship in Vovchansk [North East Ukraine] from August 2021 to August 2022. 

In February 2022, when the war started, there was constant shelling. It was surreal to realise the war had started. Everything was chaotic, and the scariest part was having nowhere to hide. If something had hit us there, we wouldn’t have stood a chance. 

There were constant drones. It was strange how quickly the Russians pushed in, and back then you couldn’t tell which direction they were coming from like you can now. Another problem was that the Russians jammed mobile communications and the internet, and they cut the power."

It turned out that we weren’t really being raised only by our foster mother, it became clear her motivation for taking in children was financial. She didn’t really care about us. So we had to process all our emotions on our own. 

At the start of the war, our school said they would not cooperate with the Russian authorities or the occupiers at all. But by spring, a large Russian flag appeared with the words ‘For Peace’ or ‘For Victory.’

For me, the forced transfer happened because of my teacher. She came to my house and said I absolutely had to go study in Russia because there was no way to study here. My answer was no, even though the Russians had destroyed everything: hospitals, schools, technical colleges. But still, I was sent to study in Russia."

"There was no choice of specialties either, and that was something I didn’t like. This only reinforced my feeling that I didn’t want to go there.

For my brother, it happened [transferred to Russia] because of a neighbouring pro Russia foster family. I think Russian propaganda was involved.

Our foster family was close with them, especially the kids. Information spread that foster children were going to a summer camp in Russia. And so, all our neighbours’ children, including my brother and a foster brother, were sent to the camp.

“How do people communicate if there’s no mobile connection? They just went to the neighbour, told him, and he went to another neighbour.... And in this way, the information spread throughout the entire community.

My brother told me that one of his teachers went with them, along with some military personnel and military vehicles. He said there were a lot of buses. So, it wasn’t a one-time thing, it was massive and planned long in advance.

We left on different days. He left on August 27 or 28, I left on the 31st, and the very next day I was already in line as a student.

Three months after starting my studies in Russia, I was kicked out of the dormitory because they tried to force me to get a Russian passport. They told me that as an orphan, I was entitled to housing, permanent financial support from the community, and a wonderful life in Russia.

This information came from different people. It could be the deputy director, a teacher, a curator, a librarian, or the dormitory staff. I kept hearing it over and over, but I always replied, ‘thank you, but I’m not interested right now.’ 

I still wanted to return to Ukraine if possible. I also told them that I am a Ukrainian child, and my ‘deprived of parental care’ status applies only within Ukraine. They told me that it no longer worked that way, but I stuck to my answer.

During one geography lesson, while explaining the topic about countries and territories. She suddenly started saying that if Russia hadn’t attacked, Ukraine would have attacked them. She claimed Ukraine had already been preparing for an offensive and was ready to fight, but Russia got ahead of them."

[After Ksenia was removed from the college] “I had to work because I needed money for food. I ended up living with an old acquaintance.

I started looking for ways to return. But it was still very hard to have contact with Ukraine while I was in Russia. One day, I called my brother and that became the turning point for me. I asked him if he would go back to Ukraine with me if we had the chance. He said, ‘Yes, that would be great.’ 

From then on, I actively searched for organisations or volunteers. I had already been thinking about possible ways to leave, but the difficulty was that my brother was living with a Russian foster family under their care.

My goal was to get him out of his Russian family. Our foster mother in Ukraine no longer wanted anything to do with him. When the Russians closed the border after Vovchansk was liberated, I called her and asked her to take him back while there was still a chance. But she refused. And I realised that from then on, the responsibility for him, and for saving both of us, would depend entirely on me and my efforts.

Through a friend, I got in touch with social services in Ukraine, told them my story, and said I needed help because we were in Russia and wanted to return, but I didn’t know how to do it or who to turn to. 

After talking to the social worker, we were connected to Save Ukraine, everything we needed was organised by them. They prepared all the documents for the Russian social services that were needed since my brother was under their care. This was the only way to reach my brother, because I couldn’t take him away on my own.”

Preparing a single rescue mission can take weeks or even months.  For safety and security reasons, we cannot share further details of how this rescue took place.

"When I spoke to him again face-to-face, he refused to leave. I had to fight hard to persuade him. I was anxious, but I knew I had to do whatever it took to bring him back. I said if he didn’t want to live with me, I’d bring him back."

Once children return, Save Ukraine provide trauma-informed care, therapy, and programmes to help them heal, regain stability, and reintegrate into Ukrainian society.

“At first, I was thrilled to be back in Ukraine. But I realised there were many urgent issues I had to deal with right away including whether to go back to school or not. I had to work to earn money, take care of my brother and decide whether he would live with me. I was just 18, I had only just become an adult myself, and suddenly I was responsible for another child.

There was no guarantee he would accept me as a mother figure instead of just a sister. So we decided to look for a good [foster] family for him. We both understood we had to start from scratch.

I want to sincerely thank Mykola Kuleba [CEO of Save Ukraine], who still helps us with any questions we have. I’m proud to be part of this incredible team that fights every day to save and rehabilitate children."

"This was planned a long time ago. And Russia is simply carrying out that plan now.

We need to broaden our view of this war, not just in terms of war crimes, missiles, and drones. We must also learn from the children’s perspective.

For me, it’s incredibly valuable when children return, I see their condition, hear their stories, and realize that maybe, through my story, there’s a small part of me that helped bring at least one more child home.

Returning Ukrainian children is, to me, the same as bringing back our soldiers who were prisoners of war. It’s simply an escape from Russian captivity. And we must help, keep transporting children [back to Ukraine], no matter the obstacles. I want Ukraine to have that same determination, that everyone who cares works to bring every child home.”