As we know all too well, earlier this yr, Russia invaded the Ukraine.
As war began – the First Lady of Ukraine, Olelna Zalenska was faced w the reality that her fam was going to be split up. Her husband went to Kiev to lead the country’s battle plans, & Olena took her young fam & went into hiding on Feb 24th. It was described that she had to leave the family’s pets & barely had time to pack anything, in order to get to safety.
The immediate move halted her projects on healthcare & education she’d been working on for the country – but this was life or death…no choice.
Like others arnd the world, when she was in hiding, she’d watch things unfold on social media.
Roughly 8 million residents were being displaced by the war – mostly women & children. The number of military personnel grew steadily, & has roughly tripled since the start of the invasion, to ~ 700,000. A ton of trauma to experience for the displaced families…& for those fighting the war.
In this Time piece, she was quoted as saying: “Every day you read about them, you hear about them, you absorb it, & it has an effect. Each of us, including myself, have felt that our psychological state is not what it should be. None of us are OK.”
Given that bkgrnd, after 10 wks in hiding, Olena emerged as a leader to help the country cope w that trauma – both collective & personal trauma, from the war.
In May she launched a govt initiative to make psychological support avail to every Ukrainian. It’s begun training trauma counselors, setting up hotlines & working w foreign experts for clinical support.
She’s recently shared “There could be enormous consequences for our country if we end up w post traumatic stress that goes untreated as a country. Imagine how this could affect the psyche of a normal child, who was not raised for war, not taught to hate…It will be a generational challenge to help them heal.”
Imagine that – ok the backdrop is war, but a public figure w a lot of pull, married to the president, acknowledging & working on programs to get in FRONT of lived experience trauma EVERYONE will have. The US & others could learn from this example of leadership.