For nearly six months, Oksana, a resident of central Kyiv, has been making audio diaries documenting her life in a country at war.
But in a raw and vivid diary entry recorded for Sky News’ Ukraine War Diaries podcast this week, the 35-year-old offers a revealing insight into the impact of months of air raid alerts and the effect of combat stress.
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“When I look at a beautiful building [now]I have this little kind of flash when I see it destroyed by a rocket or a fire, and you know, it doesn’t really take a lot of imagination to see that,” he explains.
“I just see it for a second and then I have to go back, calm down, it’s okay.”
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Oksana (right) and her partner Seva live in central Kyiv
Returning from a road trip to visit Ukrainian friends in Belgium recently, Oksana reveals how her bus drove away from a group of airstrikes, while Russian forces targeted urban centers along the route she was traveling.
Since the start of the war, Oksana and the residents of Kyiv have endured missile attacks and hundreds of air raid alerts.
In the first weeks of the war, a second home that Oksana owns in Bucha, a region now synonymous with allegations of war crimes, was raided and used as a base by Russian soldiers.
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Oksana (right) tells Sky News Ukraine War Diaries about her experience living on Europe’s new front line
“I think [the hallucinations] they are connected with me observing a lot of destruction in real time in the Kyiv region and also in different parts of Ukraine,” he continues.
“It happens everywhere.”
From the creators of Sky News’ award-winning StoryCast, Ukraine War Diaries is a weekly podcast that follows those living on Europe’s new front line and those who have escaped it.
Producer: Robert Mulhern
Digital promotion and additional writing: David Chipakupaku