I did not leave.  I live in Kyiv, my husband and all my relatives are in Ukraine, so I chose to stay when the Russians invaded on 24 February.  It’s very important to me to be in the country; to feel everything as a citizen and respond.

My life was changed eight years ago, when Russia annexed Crimea where I grew up.  This was the start of the war.  So, in some way I was prepared for what happened at the start of this year.  Although, I had known that the cruel war would continue, I couldn’t imagine that it would be so horrible.  Today I live in total uncertainty: my husband can be deployed, my house can be destroyed, my life can be lost.

As psychologists, we prepare for what we can: we study, we prepare ourselves psychologically, and we work preventatively.

I am 35 years old and have been the President of the National Psychological Association of Ukraine (NPA) for 3 years.  In many ways, I am a representative of the generation of psychologists who were educated in the independent Ukraine.  We are proactive and have a very strong desire to develop our profession and set high standards of quality in psychology.  Our association is quite young – we were established in 2017 – but we are already a member of the European Federation of Psychologists’ Associations, as well as of the Global Psychology Alliance.  We are actively cooperating with international partners, including the American Psychological Association.  Our tasks during the peaceful times are popularisation of scientific psychology, training and professional support of colleagues, development of the regulatory state, and organisational legislation in the field of psychology.

Psychologists and psychology in Ukraine faces a number of challenges.  Systemically there is poor mental health legislation, insufficient funding, and confusion of roles in the mental health system.  Personally, we all now have challenges because of the war.  Many of my colleagues are refugees in other countries, some have lost their homes and loved ones, some are waiting for their husbands and children to return from the war, and some live in cities under fire.  In such conditions, some find they work better but some find they cannot.

In the future, we know that there will be problems – many hospitals have been destroyed, many towns are not fit for life.  There will be many injured soldiers, and there will be those who went through hell, who were captured, and survived torture.  There will be people with brain injuries.  The big task will be the rehabilitation of those in the military back to civilian life.  As psychologists, we prepare for what we can: we study, we prepare ourselves psychologically, and we work preventively.

We are not victims; we are protecting ourselves and our homes.

The situation is very different depending on what part of the country people live in, how long ago they left home, what they had before, and what they have already lost.  There are people who already need basic things –  a roof over their heads, food, clothes – there are those who need medical care, and there are those who need psychological and spiritual support.  If we talk about psychological presentations, then we are dealing with psychological trauma in general, acute stress, PTSD, bereavement of loved ones, the loss of property, and experiences of abuse, including sexual abuse.

We are also dealing with crises in relationships, which has become more frequent because families live apart, as well as adaptation problems in children who have moved to other cities and countries.  Recently, we have been receiving more and more requests from refugees with complaints of depressive symptoms; the pull to return home is strong, but for so many this still isn’t possible.  It is also worth mentioning that stress, uncertainty and problems with obtaining high-quality medical care in areas with active hostilities or in other countries, has also led to the worsening of existing mental health problems.

Although the war has exacerbated everything that may have existed before and added a lot of additional anxiety, pain, fear, and anger, it is also important to say that as a society we are quite stable and mobilised.  The idea of victory is very supportive, as is the understanding that the truth is on our side.  We do a lot of things that not only support our country and our military, but also for ourselves.  We Ukrainians are active, determined, and brave, despite everything we know we are fighting against.  This is a very healthy and therapeutic position.  We are not victims; we are protecting ourselves and our homes.

During the 1970s and 80s, being a psychologist was not a common profession in the Soviet Union.  In the whole country there were very few people trained.  Only around fifteen psychologists a year came out of each university in the larger cities and many of these people worked with the secret services, were involved in organisational psychology at state-owned enterprises, or worked in education.

Psychotherapy was not widespread in those days and there were no privately run psychological services.  The focus was very much on psychopathology, and practiced by psychiatrists (who were trained in medical schools separately from psychologists) in public hospitals.  However, after the collapse of the state the demand for private services and psychology sharply rose and the development of psychology began.  Universities began to offer retraining programs for pedagogical and social workers, as well as other associated sciences.  Yet, there was no unified protocol of psychological science and it was hard to keep track of the numbers, because the educational statistics were not representative of the reality.

The turn of the millennium also marked a new period in psychological studies. Now universities offer a wide range of bachelors and masters degree courses in psychology. Every year they have been improving and meeting international standards, although there is still a lot of work that needs to be done regarding standardisation and quality assurance.  Whilst it is still difficult to calculate the exact number of psychologists in Ukraine, according to our data we have now have about 20,000 colleagues nationwide.

From the first day of the war we have been doing what we can to help our people.

As a professional community, the NPA have organised additional training and supervision for colleagues, and we help as much as we can with employment in other countries.  We have asked colleagues around the work from partner organisations to stop working with psychologists from Russia, as many of them support this war whilst the rest are passive and indifferent while Ukrainians die, and the whole world is trying to stop this madness.  We believe this is contrary to the values of humanism and human rights, which are declared by many professional communities.

From the first day of war we have been doing what we can to help our people.  It doesn’t matter if someone needs psychological support, or the contact details for mental health professionals in Ukraine, or details of Ukrainian-speaking specialists in other countries, we help those who get in touch with us as much as we can.

We have updated our psychological support hotline, supported by private donations, the European Union, the United Nations Development Programme and the American Psychological Association.  The hotline operates on a free number available for those in Ukraine (0-800-100-102) from 10am to 8pm.  Callers can request an audio or video consultation with psychologists specially trained in providing crisis and trauma-informed interventions, and dealing with various types of violence.  All consultations are confidential and if necessary we can refer people onwards to other specialists.

We are trying to organise psychological assistance in all countries where Ukrainians may be.  Thanks to technical support from Amazon and Deloitte, we also have freephone numbers for Ukrainians living in ​Poland, the Czech Republic, France, Portugal, Sweden, Ireland, Italy, Austria, with more countries added soon.  In one month we received 350 calls from Ukrainians abroad.  This is a very important service as it provides help and support to Ukrainians even when they are far from home, living in unfamiliar countries in small towns where there are often no volunteer psychologists who speak Ukrainian.  This service is currently unfunded form September, and we are urgently looking for additional funding to keep it open.

We need funding to be able to help more people, more efficiently, and the NPA has launched a fundraising campaign to begin looking for centralised funding.  We appreciate everything from individual donations to larger sponsorship deals to keep our hotlines open.

We would be very grateful to continue to receive free educational projects that support and up-skill our specialists in the field of mental health, both for those living in Ukraine and those who are temporarily in the UK.

Political pressure and representation are also important.  For our colleagues who are temporarily in the UK, it is very difficult to find a job because of the big difference in legislation and training.  We have a lot of talented and smart colleagues who could be a great help and support for psychologists in the UK.  They are ready to work and contribute to the development of psychology in your country.

If there is hell somewhere, then it is now in Ukraine.

We will experience the traumas of this war for generations to come.  Understanding that Russia wants to destroy you as a Ukrainian is a very difficult concept.  Russian soldiers rape, torture, castrate, and humiliate us just because we want to live in our own country and not in Russia.  Our language is instantly removed from schools in the occupied territories, as if it did not exist and our rich culture is denied.  Believe me, living in this situation is traumatic.  It is traumatic to live with the feeling that at any moment a Russian rocket could fly into your house, just because someone decided to punish us for our ‘disobedience’.  It is hard for those who are deployed to the frontline now, who lose their friends every day.  It is hard for those who have lost everything they had.  If there is hell somewhere, then it is now in Ukraine and this hell was brought to us by Russia.

Now we are very mobilised as a society.  We defend ourselves, and we don’t have the opportunity to relax.  I think when we win in the end, although moral exhaustion may await us as after the victory and we will realise the wave of problems that the war has brought us for many years.

The consequences of this war will not only be direct – like deaths, losses, and experiences of violence – but also indirect, when people will suffer the consequences of the economic crisis, demographic and social problems.

Therefore, we are helping today and preparing for new challenges tomorrow.

To read more on the Ukraine conflict, click here.

Links to useful resources can also be found in our Guidance section.