Story #41. Loss of Husband due to Russian Invasion of Ukraine

August 19, 2022
The story of Nadiya Lytovchenko, whose husband was killed in the war.
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I am 38 and a widow. My husband died in the war. Yes, at war, in the 21st century, in the center of Europe. This is who I am now.

I don't feel like myself anymore. My body does not fully belong to me. I either don't eat or eat too much. The taste of the food is lean and bland. Periodically, I catch myself thinking that I am eating what my husband loved.

I am "heavy" and "woolly", like a clumsy toy stuffed with straw. It's hard for me to move my legs, sometimes I can't hold things in my hands. Even the phone feels too heavy.

I'm a widow, I'm still young. But I don't feel beautiful anymore. I can no longer agree with myself about my external flaws, now I only see them. I can't be beautiful anymore. Not because I don't want to. I don't have the strength for it.

I am like a torn and faded pumpkin left alone in the field. Maybe not completely alone, because there are enough torn pumpkins in the field, I am not the only one who will never hug her husband again.

My son is growing up so fast and his dad doesn't see it anymore. He is growing and I don't have enough resources to give him the attention he needs right now. I froze. I stopped. I'm confused. I'm petrified. People clap my shoulder, say words of support and gratitude. Time is running out. There are fewer people and in the end I am alone in a dark, empty apartment. Everyone goes to their families, but I no longer have one.

Sometimes I forget that he died and I live the way I lived before, in calm worry. But reality still insists. It will never be the same again. No one will ever take away my sorrow, sadness, uncertainty, bitterness, and anger.

I'll never forget who did this. Who stole my dreams, gutted my happiness, destroyed my life.

The only thing I really want now is for the bullets of our soldiers to reach the bodies of the enemy, for the artillery to hit even more precisely, for the enemy to be destroyed without pity and pain, without compassion and remorse.

I want Russia to not exist anymore. And no one will do this except you (the Ukrainian military). Yes, at the cost of our own lives, yes, at the cost of our widowhood, yes, at the cost of the postponed happy future of our children. We will restore everything after victory, we will restore ourselves. We will grow a nation again. As our mothers and grandmothers did for centuries before us.

Perhaps in that distant dreamy future, we, torn and faded pumpkins, will want to live a little, find ourselves and our new meanings. Armed forces of Ukraine, bring this day closer for us.

Nadiya and her husband met in 2015 at military courses. Then they worked as paramedics. In 2018, Nadia's husband was offered a job as a software developer in France, and the couple moved to Marseille.

Last year, they had a son. But Nadiya's husband always said that there would be a big war and was preparing for it. He was a warrior in spirit. Nadiya could not stop him, so she let him go. He was a platoon commander of a separate rifle regiment and was killed in the Kharkiv region.

This material was prepared with financial support from the International Renaissance Foundation.