Ksenia the Unbreakable
Ksenia Bashkirova and her three children join the Lviv Life Center as refugee residents.
“My name is Ksenia Bashkirova. A couple of years ago, we were a happy family…father, mother, and two children... Nothing foreshadowed trouble. But the dark side of life began. Exactly five years ago, on the birthday of my youngest son, my husband's eye started hurting. The next morning, the pain for him was unbearable. The diagnosis was a "corneal ulcer.”
A terrible nightmare began: treatment, injections in the eye, and five operations at the Hospital in the Odessa city, one botched surgery, and additional surgeries that ended up saving his eye. It all lasted for more than a year and cost a lot of money and stress on the family. He was weakened.
He wasn’t able to work, so I tried to support the family. I took up jobs cleaning apartments. I have had bronchial asthma since childhood, so the smells of various chemicals also affected my health. But we needed money, so I did it.
I walked by foot to work in order to save on bus money. At the end of the day, I couldn't feel my feet. My husband’s health worsened, but no one could say anything specific, no one could make a diagnosis.
Last winter when the war started, everything fell apart. The owner of our apartment raised the rent and we could not afford it anymore. We ended up on the street. We sold the last thing we had…an old car, for pennies, because all the money went to his treatment...
Friends took us in, but they put us in a basement room with no beds and mold on the walls... the children started getting sick. A month and a half later, my husband Dima took a high fever.
None of the doctors could provide a diagnosis. Weighing just 81 lbs by that time, he groaned in pain. The ambulance came and took him to the hospital, where he died in the intensive care unit three days later. He had died of lymphoma (cancer of the lymph nodes). I’m still horrified remembering everything.
During all these trials, I found out that I was three months pregnant. I considered an abortion, but hesitated, because a baby is a gift from God. In the end, I decided to keep the child and not to take another life from our family.
I gave birth under bombs and sirens. Unfortunately, the doctor made medical errors while I was in labor which resulted in the baby’s important organs getting damaged. New challenges in our family…
After months in the hospital, a lot of money spent and debts accrued, many tests, and referrals from one doctor to another, we were prescribed various treatments to prevent my baby from becoming disabled. We fight for life every day now.”
- Ksenia Bashkirova, Client, Lviv Life Center
Ksenia Bashkirova, a widow and mother of three children, told us her story with tears in her eyes, says Lviv Life Center Director Natalia Kolesnik.
In the midst of all this horror, Ksenia found our newest Life Center in Lviv where her and her three children are currently staying as refugees. She was desperate and broken. Our Life Center provides her with groceries, baby items, diapers and a special foods for kids.
“During one of our group meetings, I heard how Ksenia shared her memories with one woman: "When I came to the Lviv Life Center for the first time and received a set of groceries, I rushed home as if on wings to tell the children that we have food and goodies for a month." Joy and happiness were visible in her eyes. She continued to share with the mothers that we should be a little kinder and more compassionate towards each other,” Director Natalia Kolesnik says.
Natalia goes on to say, “Today, when I was writing this story, I decided to call Ksenia to ask what she needed. She replied that she was too busy running to work and would be back in a few hours...this is the story of one unbreakable Ukrainian woman!”