Sadly, the war in Ukraine has resulted in the number of widows multiplying every day. Through SGA’s Widows’ Project war widows are receiving urgent supplies. Christians and churches are at the forefront of providing for their needs. This is the account of one young war widow who received aid from our partners.
Hanna Osipenko comes from Severodonetsk, Luhansk region. In civilian life, she worked as a doctor, then had experience working in the civil service. In 2018, she left the civil service to serve in the Armed Forces as a doctor, and later became the head of the medical service of the “Aidar” battalion.
Hanna’s husband, Dmytro Bakhtin, was a dynastic metallurgist from Zaporizhzhia, and after his military service and graduation from the academy, he worked at the local metallurgical plant. He joined the Armed Forces in 2020 and in the following year were married. At that time, the couple already knew that they would soon enter the combat zone near Volnovakha. The military person understands very well that in every place in the combat zone are dead and wounded comrades.
Dmytro and Hanna were married in October and in the following month they went to the war zone. In December Hanna discovered that she was pregnant. This as an unexpected joy!
Dmytro served on the front line and Hanna in the medical centre in the village of Starognativka. Sadly, Dmytro died on 28th December. He was buried next to his father in Zaporizhzhia. His mother who suffered from cancer was still alive at the time of his death. She too has since died.
Now Hanna had difficult decisions to make. While the war raged around her, resulting in dead and wounded colleagues and friends, her parents who were trapped in Severodonetsk needed to be evacuated. The railway tracks were broken, and their apartment windows were shattered. Eventually Hanna with her parents were evacuated on 11th March. On 14th July, she gave birth to a healthy daughter called Taisia.
She expresses her gratitude to the church which has provided for her through SGA’s Widows’ Project.
I sincerely thank the church and caring people for their support. I thank God for my life and the life of my daughter.
Hanna is one of many widows who has received help. We continue to send support to many like her in Ukraine, and anticipate that this support will need to increase in the coming months. Pray for the many widows, tragically multiplying in number every day.