I don't want to lose my sense of purpose

About

How can you find balance when a neighboring country is trying to destroy your country? When your hometown, where you were born and your sons were born, suffers from daily bombings (my hometown, Kharkiv, is located just 30 kilometers from the border with Russia). How can you protect your life and the lives of your loved ones? How can you ultimately not lose your SENSE of existence?

On February 24, 2022, I was at home in Kharkiv with my family. Amidst the constant explosions and phone calls with relatives and friends, I couldn't stop thinking: "WHAT NOW? WHAT IS THE POINT OF EVERYTHING YOU HAVE BUILT AND STRIVED FOR: the future of your family, your country, your children, your career, etc., etc.?"

At that moment, saving lives became the most important thing; overriding everything else. In early March 2022, my husband drove me and the children to a safer city in central Ukraine: Kropyvnytskyi. My older son was forced to stay there, and I traveled further west with my younger one a few days later. My husband went back to Kharkiv, despite the danger, to run his business.

Picture the spring of 2022, the city of Lviv was sheltering hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the war from the east and south of Ukraine. My 10-year-old son and I were part of the mass, for several days. Sleeping on the floor of a school is not the best way to rest, but it is 100% better than not sleeping at all from constant explosions.

And then there was refuge in the Czech Republic. Not understanding the language, working shifts in a factory, and living in a workers' hostel was not what anyone would aspire to in life. Living apart from your husband, parents, and older son, who remained in Ukraine, is not just difficult, it's almost impossible. But you have a SENSE of purpose—you brought your child out of danger. A month after moving to the Czech Republic, my younger son stopped being afraid of loud noises and began to sleep peacefully through the night.

I thought I would only be in the Czech Republic for a short time, three months at most... I remained there for six. Then there was less work at the factory, and Ukrainian women began to be fired. I was faced with a choice: where to go next? I wanted to return home, but Kharkiv was being shelled every day. My husband persuaded me to “spend the winter” in Germany...

Again, a foreign country, a completely incomprehensible language, “incomprehensible rules of life,” a new school for my child...

I spent three winters in Germany. The place where I turned up is incredibly picturesque: mountains, forests, a wonderful hotel (yes, I stayed in a hotel), amazingly beautiful. It's beautiful when it's your vacation, but not when it's three years of your life with unknown status, unknown future, and unknown SENSE.

At some moment you have to decide whether you are “here” or “there” at home in Ukraine. I was both ‘“here” and “there.” My son studied at a German school during the day and at a Ukrainian online school in the evening. Every year, I dreamed that “this spring” I would definitely go home... and stayed for the sake of my child's safety.

But one day I saw an advertisement in Ukraine that said: “A job for those who don't just want to go to work, but WANT TO FIND SENSE IN THEIR LIFE.” And... I went to an interview, then another, in a small town called Kolomyia, in southwestern Ukraine. Success. And I feel like I'm already at home here. Yes, with new challenges: a new job, a new home, a new school for my now 14-year-old son. Yes, with nighttime alarms and the sounds of shahids. I TRY NOT TO LOSE MY SENSE OF PURPOSE.

During these 3.5 years of my exile, I 've managed to:
1) live anywhere and work anywhere,
2) learn to appreciate what is most valuable,
3) learn a little Czech and quite a bit of German,
4) always have a plan B, or better yet, plans B and C,
5) drive a car in Germany (which I didn't dare to do for 20 years in Ukraine).

On August 30, 2025, my younger son Yehor and I moved to the city of Kolomyia. It is 700 km from my native Kharkiv, but I feel at home here. I drove my German car more than 1,000 km and now I want this car to serve our guardian angels from the Armed Forces of Ukraine. My car will go to the front to a soldier, a friend of my family, who is defending us in eastern Ukraine, in Donbas.

How not to lose the sense?

Day 1 of the war. I closed the windows to protect against possible glass debris.

My younger son Yehor is at the refugee center. Lviv, March 2022

Yehor and I are on a bus taking us to the Czech Republic. Mid-March 2022

Yehor in Prague. End of March 2022.

I work at a factory in the Czech Republic.

I am in a workers' hostel in the Czech Republic.

First day in Germany. Berlin, October 2022, 5 a.m.

Germany, Harz Mountains. October 2022

Sunrise in Shulenberg, where I lived in Germany. December 2022

New Year 2023 in Shulenberg, and Yehor was upset that we were celebrating alone, without his dad and his brother.

I am in Lviv with my eldest son Lev. We met in January 2023, on his birthday, for the first time since March 2022.

I am visiting my hometown of Kharkiv. An exhibition of Russian rockets and shells that were used to attack our city. July 2023

Sunset in my backyard in Kharkiv. July 2023.

I could mostly see my eldest son online. Autumn 2023.

Flowers on the windowsill in the hotel in Shulenberg where I lived. March 2024.

Yehor and I are visiting Kharkiv. Our family is celebrating Yehor's birthday. In the dark, after a massive attack on Kharkiv.

I'm driving for the first time. May 2024.

Yehor is studying online at a Ukrainian school.

Meeting with family in Chernivtsi. December 2024. We haven't seen each other since March 2024.

Meeting with my eldest son in Kolomyia, where I came for a job interview. June 2025.

June 2025. Kolomyia.

August 2025. Kolomyia. My children met for the first time since December 2024.

The door at customs on the border between Poland and Ukraine. I'm going home. August 2025.

I'm getting my stuff off the auto in Kolomyia. August 30, 2025.

My car is for these guys from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, thanks to whom I can dream about the future in my country.

I just don't want to lose the SENSE

My story, which connected with this one story

braveaction.org View more

Ilona Batulina

Is Ukraine's history alive today?

explore a work