Help Mykola and Valentyna Zaprykuta Find a permanent home at "Our People" Senior Center

Valentyna (77) and Mykola (84) spent their working lives in industry. She was a chemical technologist, and he served as a plant foreman. Together, they built a modest home and looked forward to a peaceful retirement. That peace ended abruptly in February 2022, when the invasion reached their city and their house was destroyed almost immediately.

With nowhere else to go, they ran to Valentina’s sister’s house, which had a basement. There they hid for 55 long days. The basement became their world — dark, cold, and suffocating. They survived on canned food, unable to cook because even a wisp of smoke would draw fire from the enemy. Their well was shattered, leaving them to scrape for water whenever possible. Wagner fighters roamed the streets, searching for people, but the neighbors refused to open their doors out of fear. It was in that basement that Valentina suffered a stroke, leaving her weak and barely able to walk.

Eventually, they moved to a local school that had been turned into a makeshift shelter, joining 200 others. Volunteers brought food, clothing, and wooden boards to sleep on, but as the fighting intensified, even the volunteers stopped coming. Fear and hunger filled the days until, finally, through a friend’s help, they managed to evacuate in April. First to Bakhmut, then to Dnipro, and eventually to Kyiv, where their granddaughter and son live. Their son, however, has also suffered a stroke, leaving him struggling with his own health. Their daughter remains in Russia, cut off from contact. Valentyna and Mykola now live in Kyiv, carrying the trauma of those 55 days in the basement, and the grief of losing their home and health to war.