The defender, who sustained a severe brain injury and lost the ability to speak and walk, is supported daily by his wife. For four months, the specialists of the National Rehabilitation Center UNBROKEN have been making every effort to restore the soldier. Together with the defender’s beloved, they rejoice in the patient’s success.

Oleksiy Lytovchenko from Odesa is 36 years old. In civilian life, he was a construction worker. When the ATO began in 2014, the man voluntarily took up arms and went to defend the country. Later, when he and his wife Yevheniia had their first child, Oleksii decided to demobilize. He returned to civilian life, worked and raised his son until February 24, 2022. The man could not let the enemy reach his native Odesa, so he rejoined the Armed Forces of Ukraine, where he joined the 28th Brigade named after the Knights of the Winter Campaign. As part of it, he took part in the liberation of Kherson and battles in Donetsk region.

Oleksiy sustained a severe brain injury last summer in the Bakhmut sector. The defender was digging a trench when a mortar attack began – this is the last thing he remembers. He regained consciousness only in intensive care – a month and a half after being wounded. All this time his wife Yevhenia was by his side: “When I saw him, I was happy. The main thing is that he is alive, and we will overcome everything else together.” As a result of the injury, Oleksiy’s left hemisphere of the brain, which is responsible for memory, speech and writing, was damaged. When he regained consciousness, he could not speak or walk and had little memory.

After a long treatment in Kharkiv, Oleksiy was sent for rehabilitation in Lviv, to the UNBROKEN Center. Here, a whole team of specialists takes on the recovery of a difficult patient: physical therapists, speech and language therapists, psycho- and occupational therapists. The wife is by his side every day. In the ward, in the rehabilitation room, at every session or procedure, she is with her beloved.

“When Oleksiy was admitted to us, he was completely dependent on his wife. All he could do on his own was to get out of bed. He had no balance and no coordination. We immediately drew up an individual rehabilitation plan. And as soon as Oleksiy started to show results, we switched to high-intensity training with him,” says physical therapist Andriy Novosad.

Oleksiy has been at the Unbreakable Center for four months now. He has learned to walk. The sessions with a speech and language therapist are also showing results. Every day, the unbreakable defender is relearning the ability to speak, read, write and memorize. He also smiles a lot.

His family believes in Oleksiy’s recovery: his beloved wife and son, who is waiting for his father and mother to return home to Odesa.

UNBROKEN Ukraine: treatment, rehabilitation, prosthetics, reintegration of Ukrainians in Ukraine.