Today we would like to share with you the life story of a woman we met during the Mobile Team’s activity in one of the northern regions of our country.
From the very beginning of the military invasion of Ukraine, Lydia and her family found themselves under occupation, and only by a miracle, saving the lives of her children, she managed to leave Ukraine and reach Moldova, leaving her husband, home, and work. Throughout her stay in our country, Lydia tried to get used to a new way of life, new conditions and customs. Lydia’s children went to the local school, Lydia always happily and actively participated in our information sessions, when she needed psychological or social help, she turned to me and my colleagues from the mobile team for this, receiving support and understanding.
Lydia began to do what she liked – to make dolls, she knitted, sewed, painted, and this filled the emptiness in her heart of homesickness, distracting her from the news about the war, about the pain and tragedy that are taking place in her homeland.
A few months ago, during our meeting, Lydia said that recently she had begun to face aggression from her husband: he blackmailed her via SMS, threatened her, manipulated her, accused her of behaving indecently and persuaded her to return to him in Ukraine. Lydia, leaving her children in Moldova, went to her husband for a few days to talk with him on the spot and resolve the conflict that had arisen.
Here is what Lydia told me during a personal meeting: “When I communicated with my husband, I did not recognize him, he changed for the worse, he screamed, threatened me, hit me and forced me into intimate relationships, although I was against it. I understood that he started drinking alcohol. He spent half a year fighting at the forefront and came back a completely different person. During the period when I attended the information sessions of the Mobile Team, I began to understand a lot, I formed my opinion about the unacceptability of domestic violence, about the unacceptability of gender inequality in the modern world, so I decided to leave Ukraine, and I am thinking about divorce.”
I helped Lydia get legal advice, support from a lawyer, I contacted a psychologist who provides her with free psychological services.
It is very sad to realize that women who have been forced to leave their homes and settle in a foreign country while rescuing children have to face aggression from their closest relatives, but it is encouraging that, with the help of UNFPA Moldova and the Artemida Public Association, Mobile Teams have been created, which support women by providing them with psychological and social support, informing women about assistance services for victims of domestic violence and gender inequality.
