For Valeria Stashko and Elyzaveta Kolomiets, the morning of February 24, 2022 shattered the illusion that war was merely a relic of the past. In the quiet village of Nizhni Sirohozy and across the occupied territories of the Kherson region, their early memories transformed into harrowing accounts of confusion, fear, and a desperate scramble for safety. From whispered warnings in the dead of night to the relentless echo of explosions, these personal testimonies capture the brutal intrusion of war into youth, alongside the resilient hope for a return to peace and the joy of a safe home.
Nizhni Sirohozy by Valeria Stashko
When you are 15 years old, war seems like something distant, immortalized in history. It would seem that in the 21st century, such a concept should no longer exist. Have people not learned from historical experience? Do they not understand that war is a terrible thing? What about human lives?
I continue to ask myself these questions even now, at almost 19, but I still do not understand why, on February 24, 2022, war came to my home.
That February morning, I woke up to strange sounds. In the next room, my mother and father were nervously whispering about something. At first, I could not understand what was happening, but in light of recent news, a terrible thought crossed my mind. Then I heard my father say he was looking for updates. It was around 5 a.m., and there was only one piece of news online, “Putin has announced the start of the war”.
At that moment, there were no official statements from President Zelensky, and it all felt like a horrible nightmare. But no. The worst nightmare had become reality.
What did I feel at that moment? Complete confusion, anxiety, helplessness, and fear for the lives of my family.
My sister and I spent a long time calming our mother while hastily packing our bags. We had nowhere to run, no shelter to hide in. We were completely lost, but we tried not to show it to each other. My father immediately went to the pharmacy for medicine, bought food, and stocked up on fuel. That day felt incredibly long, as did the following weeks. But we all hoped it would end quickly.
To give you some context – I am from the Kherson region, the village of Nizhni Sirohozy, which is now a temporarily occupied territory.
Three years have passed since that day, and the most important thing I have realized is: “What a joy it is to have a home and the ability to return there at any moment. What a joy it is when your family is safe. What a joy it is not to know what war is”.
When war became part of your childhood by Elyzaveta Kolomiets
I was 8 when the war started. I was 15 when I first felt what it was like to live under occupation. I am 18 now and I still live in a country where the war is ongoing. In a country where you never know for sure whether you will have a quiet night or have to listen to the sounds outside your window. For all Ukrainians, life changed when the full-scale invasion by the aggressor country began. At that time, I lived in the Kherson region, so my morning didn’t start like most.
At 5:30 I woke up hearing sounds that were incomprehensible to me, feeling nausea and trembling in my body. It took me half an hour to calm down. It was then that my mother told me that all the nearest towns were under fire. A full-scale invasion had begun. Your first thoughts were: what will happen next? What does it mean for us? You live with these thoughts all the time and do not understand what to do. For some people, occupation is just a scary word that has affected some Ukrainians. For me, it’s not just a word, for me, it’s 9 months of waiting, living in fear and realizing that something can happen to you or your family at any time. Every day you see the invaders, their weapons, hear explosions. You see it all with your own eyes, you know it not from stories, but personally. For the first two or three weeks I thought that it would not last long, but now I am 16, and it is still going on. I am still under pressure from others, I am still under occupation and there is no safe way out. The emotions you feel when you see the Ukrainian military, when you realize that you are free, cannot be described in words. It is a feeling of freedom, gratitude, and joy.
You know that you will continue to have to listen to explosions, you will have to live in fear, but you are liberated, and it makes it easier. Now I am 18, I live in Kyiv, I study here, but I still listen to the explosions. I still worry about my family, because they are there, in the Kherson region. I don’t think I need much to be happy, just that it all ends as soon as possible.
