LVIV – Thirteen displaced women who are expecting a child or have recently given birth are living in Lviv at the “Unbroken Mothers” Mother and Child Center. In total, the Center is hosting 23 children with their mothers, of which 9 are newborns.

How is life at the Center for displaced mothers?

Internally displaced women who have recently given birth and expectant mothers are accommodated in two two-story buildings with 13 rooms in each. Next to the buildings, there is a cosy playground, a place to take babies for a walk. At the entrance to the buildings, there are baby carriages. Inside, in front of each of the room doors, shoes are stacked. There is a spacious kitchen, laundry rooms, and playrooms for kids.

In this shelter, one is welcomed by its little residents.

One of them is Olha Shevchenko’s daughter. The 32-year-old displaced woman lives in a room with her four children. Everybody has their own bed, there is a place for studying. Daryna was born in Lviv three months ago. Olha had to run from the war and occupation for the second time in her life. In 2014, she left Khrustalne, Luhansk region with her two children while being pregnant with the third one. Back then she found shelter in her parent’s village of Bilovodsk, Luhansk region. The second time she had to run away was from Lysychansk: under heavy shelling, having three children aged 7, 9 and 11, and being pregnant with the fourth child.

«I will not live in Russia. I said it back then, and I’m saying it now. My husband stayed in Khrustalne in 2014, while I left, on my own. I don’t want my children to live in Russia. My sister who stayed with our parents under the occupation tells terrible stories. Food and clothes are extremely expensive. They are under shellfire all the time.

In March we lived in a basement for a whole week. And when we ran out of food and the shellfire didn’t cease for a moment I decided it was time to evacuate. I took the documents and together with the kids and other people we went to the train station in Lysychansk. We were ill when we arrived. We learnt we were in Lviv only upon our arrival. We stayed in a dormitory. Once the Center opened, we moved into it. Elder children go to school here. I will do anything for my children,” says Olha.

The “Unbroken Mothers” Center was opened in August, but its first residents – Tetiana Oliinykova and her 7-year-old son Yehor – moved there as early as July. Later the woman went to the maternity hospital to give birth and then came back with her newborn son Sviatoslav, who is two months old today.

In late March, when Tetiana was still pregnant, she took her son and left Russian-occupied Starobilsk. It was dangerous for her to remain there since her husband is a border guard. The woman says that cars with Russian soldiers were driving around the city looking for those who hung the Ukrainian flag, those who had relatives serving in the Armed Forces, in “Azov” regiment. Therefore, her husband asked her to pack up as quickly as possible and leave with their son.

“We packed whatever could in a bag and left. We left our house in Starobilsk. There are tenants from Lysychansk living in it now. Starobilsk and Lysychansk are under occupation. We arrived in Lviv on March 31. I registered as soon as April 1. We lived in a school up till July 17.

It is very cosy living at the Center. We have our own room full of light. It is very expensive to rent an apartment. We couldn’t afford it and to buy food on top of that. What’s next? We live from day to day. It’s hard to plan your future when everything can change overnight. My parents, brother with his wife and child stayed in Starobilsk. He didn’t leave because he didn’t know where to go. I didn’t know where I was going either, I was going nowhere, but my husband’s friend helped me,” says Tetiana Oliinykova.

Tetiana says that when her husband served in the east, when there was constant danger, the hardest thing was to quiet her mind. She was restless. When he was relocated to Zakarpattia region, he got a chance to see his wife and children. But then there was another rotation and he was sent to the eastern regions again.

Like her fellow residents of the Center, the woman cooks on her own and buys food on her own. Her elder son goes to a nearby local school. Presently, there are 13 women living in the “Unbroken Mothers” Center, three of them are expecting new babies soon. Prior to being accommodated in the Center, women sign an agreement for six months. At the end of this term, the agreement is revised and prolonged until the child is one year old.

«We have internally displaced women from the occupied territories, as well as from those where hostilities are taking place. Women can plan their daily routines as they want. We organize training sessions for children, provide social and household services. Women buy food on their own. When volunteers help, we then distribute the products,” says Liliia Kilchytska, head of the “Unbroken Mothers” Mother and Child Service.

Volunteers bring baby carriages, cribs, clothes, diapers, other necessary for babies things. These houses for expectant mothers were built with the funds of the Red Cross and the Lviv City Council.

It is forbidden for men to live with women at the Center. However, the grandmother was allowed to stay at the Center and help take care of her granddaughter. Viktoriia came from an occupied village in the Zaporizhzhia region. On September 27, her granddaughter Amaliia was born. Her daughter was forced to leave home back in March, since she could be arrested, given her place of service.

«My daughter left and said she was pregnant when she was already in Lviv. She didn’t want us to worry. Her husband had left earlier in connection with his duties. Our village was occupied on March 3. We live in a detached house. We spent two weeks in the basement and one day we got out and saw a column of military vehicles from Russia. They were shooting non-stop. Rockets were flying and so on. One night, Russian soldiers came to our house and wanted to take our off-roader. My parents are elderly people, they approached the Russians. The latter fiddled around and left.

They went from house to house looking for Ukrainian soldiers. If these soldiers were wounded, the Russians finished them off and just left them in the streets. If somebody said something wrong they could just put a bag on their head and take them away, either to Olenivka or somewhere else.

Those who come back from there, keep silent. People are scared. Locals rat on each other a lot. In the morning, a queue of those willing to report is already lining up at the commandant’s office. Such cases are quite frequent. Then, following these reports, people get caught.

My parents are elderly, sick people, my husband is sick, I have to go back there. Dad says that no matter what he is going to die in his own house, on his own land. Empty houses and apartments that were left by local people are already occupied by strangers. Only those who have nowhere to go remained in the village,” says Viktoriia.

The shelter Viktoriia, her daughter and granddaughter received at the Center is a salvation for them, because they would not have been able to rent an apartment. Viktoriia dreams that one day the family will be together again.

Two evacuation trains arrive in Lviv on a daily basis. These are about 300 people, mainly from the eastern regions. Another hundred people arrive by evacuation buses every day.

Prepared by: Halyna Tereshchuk, Radio Svoboda