Mother’s Day in Ukraine amid Death, Fear
and Rubble
Hopefully, you had a memorable Mother’s
Day with your loving children at hand and the comfort of your warm home in
America.
No so in Ukraine.
In an emotional Mother’s Day message to all
mothers around the world, Ukraine’s First Lady Olena Zelenska drew attention to
the fate of the thousands of stolen children of her country and obligated all
of us in the free world to demand their freedom and return as if they were our
own.
In her essay in The Washington Post
published on May 11, Zelenska described the pained existence of mothers in
Ukraine who with missile fragments and bullets in their hearts shield their
children and all Ukrainian children behind their backs from russian instruments
of death and injury.
“That’s because, in a civilized world,
there are no other people’s children,” she wrote poignantly.
Since the latest
iteration of moscow’s bloody invasion of Ukraine, children have been targeted
by russian cutthroats. They have been killed in premediated missile barrages,
machinegun fire, and destruction
of homes. Both boys and girls have been raped by russians in the presence of
their mothers. They have died in drive-by shootings.
Zelenska
continued: “This is the story of women of Ukraine right now. More than 19,000
of our children are being held captive in Russia. Their families are tormented
by uncertainty.
“Since the
beginning of Russia’s brutal full-scale invasion, the mothers of Ukraine have —
as caregivers, first responders, medics, soldiers and breadwinners — fought for
the survival of their families and their country. They are part of a fight for
the survival of the democratic world order.”
With 60,000 women-volunteers in the
Armed Forces of Ukraine, Zelenska pointed out, “We need the help of the whole
world to set these children free. One Ukrainian mother may be powerless, but
thousands and millions of us standing together can succeed.”
As for her salient
observation that in war there are no other people’s children, Zelenska wrote
that mothers are expanding their family nucleus by taking in neighbors’
children in order to protect them and provide them with food, shelter and motherly love.
Among several
accounts that the First Lade cited, she related: “Six-year-old Renat and
10-year-old Varvara were living in Mariupol — the city wiped from the face of
the Earth by russian bombing — when they were sent to an orphanage in Russia.
They were torn from their mother, who had been taken prisoner.”
The emotional pain felt by surviving
mothers in Ukraine may be more acute than death or injury. Imagine, she wrote,
having to reassure every day your child during an air raid than he or she will
survive when they plead “Mom, are we going to die today?” What can a mother do
or say when she, herself, is scared and unsure of what will happen when the alarm
stops.
Her “Olena Zelenska Foundation” is
addressing this issue every day.
“We are trying to fight this growing
mental health crisis. The program ‘Are you okay?’ was created to enable a
future where, hopefully, both parents and children can one day honestly answer
that question with: ‘I'm okay.’ It’s aimed at preventing children from
remaining ‘children of war’ for the rest of their lives, she elaborated.
In the midst of day-to-day air raid
alarms and satisfying their children’s daily needs of food, shelter and schooling,
Zelenska offers this advice: “My only recipe for being a mom during the war is
to be sincere and an example of love and care. It is to teach my children the
need to care for others because that is why we are all holding on to through
the war. It is about hoping that the war will remain just an episode in the
lives of our children. That they will enjoy normal lives after it to erase that
trauma.”
“Demand our children be returned to
Ukraine!”
