The Best News About Ruslan!

A little over a month ago I had had it with our boys and their feet. Ruslan had once again walked a hole through the bottom of his shoes and another PT had told us that he couldn’t help, and said in fact “No one in Ukraine can help you.” In the throes of frustration, I decided to put it out to the wonderful Wide Awake community to see if any of you knew someone who could help our Ruslan. We had exhausted our resources here in Ukraine and at last, decided it was time to look outside our borders for help. I wrote a blog post asking for help or recommendations for Ruslan and was blown away by all of you! You all came out of the woodwork with ideas and offers to reach out to doctors on Ruslan’s behalf. Many of you even told me that you had been following us for a long time but this was your first time reaching out- and I was so so glad to hear from you! It was really encouraging to see how many of you deeply care for our boys. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

I am so pleased and thankful and EXCITED to share with you that a medical team and hospital in California have agreed to treat Ruslan’s foot for free!! It’s really going to happen! I’m still a bit in shock and I’m not sure I’ll believe it’s real until Jed and Ruslan land there in California, but believe it or not, we are moving forward in faith and doing the work on our end to make it happen. It’s so exciting, right?

Who? How? WHAAAAAAAT? I know you are dying to know the details. Sit tight and I’ll tell you. ☺️ Just a few days after I wrote the post asking for help I got an email from a super kind lady in Oregon who had been following us for years, but whom I’ve never met. We have a mutual friend ❤️ from my days working as a nurse in Oregon. She told me that she has a brother who works as an anesthesiologist at a hospital in California. She read our blog, reached out to him, and right away he was interested in helping. The anesthesiologist asked his friend, the surgeon if he was on board and he also agreed! Then that most kind anesthesiologist wrote to the hospital and the hospital answered YES! In a matter of just a few weeks, God put us in contact with the kindest people with the most generous hearts and it’s a go!

I waited a couple of weeks to share this with you because we had to figure out the issue of getting Ruslan a visa. I wanted that situation somewhat in hand before I spilled the beans. Right now, during wartime, the US embassy in Kyiv is not issuing any visas. That means that we had to find an embassy in another country at which to schedule a visa interview. Embassies always prioritize the residents of the country where the embassy is located and on most of the websites, it said that nonresidents would need to wait until 2024 for a visa interview. We really, really didn’t want to wait a year for this surgery when we have doctors and a hospital willing and able to do it whenever we’re ready! But, we worked it out and Ruslan has a visa appointment in July in Bucharest, Romania. We will need to move the date out a bit, but at least we are in their system! That was the most important part. The tentative plan as of now is for Ruslan and Jed to travel to Romania for the visa in late July or early August and then fly straight from Bucharest to California for the surgery. Once the surgery is done Ruslan will be non-weight bearing for 6 weeks. So, all together Jed and Rus will likely be gone for about 2 months. As our new anesthesiologist friend wrote, “Oh what a great adventure we are starting together” 🙂

How you can help: Jed and Ruslan will be in the Santa Cruz area for the surgery. Do any of you live near there? We do have lodging covered for Jed and Ruslan for the time they will be in California. What we definitely need help with is a car. If any of you have contacts in the area who might have an extra car that Jed could use for several weeks in early August it would be a great help. Also, any help with meals or groceries would also be just a wonderful gift. Those first few days back at the guest lodging with Rus will likely be quite difficult and any support any of you could offer Jed would be a blessing to him and Ruslan both. If you live in the area and would like to help in any way, we would love to hear from you! You can email me at kjohnson@wideawakeinternational.org

Thank you again to everyone who went for bat for Ruslan over the past month. We are really thankful for every effort made on his behalf. We don’t take it lightly and are honored that you would speak out. I promise to keep you updated on this journey toward wholeness for our Rus. Praise God for his great love for our boys!

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All About Yarik and Vova: One Year Home

Can you believe that today marks one year since Jed took our precious Yaroslav and Vova out of the institution and they joined our big Wide Awake family? One whole year! On one hand it feels like this past year flew by in a wink, but on the other hand it feels like we have lived a lifetime since the boys joined us in that church in Germany. The passing of time during war is a whole different thing. Time passes quickly, but also it feels like the war has always been. So much has happened, so much has changed over this past year. We have changed and Yarik and Vova have massively changed, but imagining them back in Romaniv is just not possible. They have always been ours.

I don’t know if you remember the story of how our boys came to be with us, but it’s worth a reminder. Before the war started we had planned that Yaroslav and Vova would be the next two boys to join our family. We were just waiting on the construction of the second side of the duplex to be completed and were keeping our eyes peeled for house parents to live there upon its completion. Then February 24th came and all our dreams were put on pause (so we thought). Most of our team and all of our boys evacuated in early March and we began living together as refugees in a church in Germany. We had been living at the church for about a month when Jed made a trip back to Ukraine to check on our team here, the Homestead, and the boys at Romaniv.

I remember standing in the church kitchen when I got a text from Jed: “I’m busting the boys out”. It was so unexpected! I was absolutely shocked. Apparently a bunch of men from institutions near the front lines had been moved to Romaniv and the institution administration was severely overwhelmed with meeting all their needs. Jed’s request to take Yarik and Vova home with him came at just the right time. He had asked before and been denied, but on this trip back to Ukraine he saw their overwhelm and decided to ask again. I’m so glad that he did.

Vova leaving Romaniv for good!
Yarik busting out of Romaniv!
Yarik (L) and Vova on their first day of freedom

The situation Jed brought them to in Germany was certainly less than ideal, but nevertheless, Yarik and Vova thrived. They adapted so well to life with all of us in the church and I really believe it was only by God’s grace that they did as well as they did. I mean, Jed took them out of Romaniv one day and they next day they began a three day road trip across Europe to get to us! Only by God’s grace- for real.

Yaroslav and Vova are like different people now. Like with all of our boys, we realize after a year with them that we never really truly knew them when they lived at Romaniv. We knew only a version of them. We knew a version of them where they lived in fear every day and their brains were continually in fight or flight mode. Now we know the real Yarik and Vova. And bit by bit, as they feel safer and more secure with us, more of their true selves is shown. It’s a beautiful and sometimes difficult process to love them through and behold. This is not our first time to watch humans learn how to be people but it never loses its magic. Watching them learn to love and trust is inspiring. Watching them test the boundaries and express their true feelings (positive and negative) can be a test in patience. Watching them experience the love of a family and find safety and security is satisfying. Bringing our boys out of lives of abuse and neglect is always a test of creativity and thinking outside of the box because no two boys adapt to new life the same way. As they change and grow our approach must change and grow. There is no one-size-fits-all in deinstitutionalization. We are reminded of that every single day.

Yaroslav. Yarik is Mr. Personality and even when he was still living at Romaniv and we dreamed about taking him home with us we would all chuckle and kind of say “What the heck are we thinking? Bringing Yarik to the Homestead? Now THAT would be no joke.” 🙂 We knew he would present some challenging behaviors and we would really need to have our ducks in a row, but really, the process has been a joy. Yes, there have been some big challenges because everything Yaroslav does is BIG. He moves big. His emotions are big. His voice is big. But his love is also big and he brings so much life to our big family. The timing of bringing Yaroslav home was right. We had some experience under our belts and our team was ready for whatever Yarik was going to bring our way. He has done amazingly well and has thrived in the love of our Wide Awake family.

Physically, Yarik is doing fine. He still struggles with some gastro issues, but nothing like in the those first few months. The state of his gastrointestinal system is very tied to his emotions, so the better he is able to manage his emotions, the more healthy he appears to be, gastro-wise. Yarik has epilepsy, but his seizures are really well controlled at the moment. His gross motor skills have greatly improved and the days when he can’t seem to control his limbs are now few and far between. His mouth was full of rotten teeth, so unfortunately, after working to get his mouth healthy he only has 3 teeth left. Poor guy! This summer we plan to see if he has enough healthy bone for a few implants.

Emotionally, Yaroslav is slowly growing and maturing. I think his biggest struggles have to do with unhealthy attachments. All of our boys struggle with attachment issues, and with good reason, after living most of their lives without any opportunity for healthy attachments at all. But Yaroslav’s struggles seem the greatest. He will attach himself to one person and then obsess over that person, cling to them and also push them away, vie for their attention in super unhealthy ways and act out in sometimes quite astonishing ways. He needs time. We aren’t worried. All will be well.

Yaroslav at his birthday party
Yarik and Rus, chillin’ in the kitchen 🙂
Yaroslav with his sister, Vlada. You can read about their story here.

Vova. Vova has had a crazy transformation this past year. He’s like a different person! Vova has Phenylketonuria (PKU) that was untreated his whole life until we began treatment in September. PKU is basically an inherited disorder in which the body can not properly break down protein for use. As the amino acid in protein is not broken down and builds up in the body it becomes toxic to the nervous system. Untreated phenylketonuria can lead to brain damage, intellectual disabilities, behavioral symptoms, seizures, skin problems, and many other things. The only treatment for PKU is a very strict diet with severely limited protein intake and the addition of a medical supplement that provides a form of protein that can be used by the body. Vova’s PKU was untreated for 27 years. So much of the damage done to his nervous system is irreversible, but as we have seen, some of his symptoms have gone away with the PKU diet. It’s been incredible to watch him change!

Vova used to shy away from any kind of physical contact, but now he seeks out contact with the people he loves. We joke that he’s like a cat, always grabbing our hands and wanting us to rub his head and face. He now goes to the toilet independently when before he was completely incontinent. Untreated PKU leads to reduced melanin in the body so before treatment Vova was sooooo pale. His hair was almost white! Now he has brown hair and color in his cheeks. I could go on and on. He has changed so much. As he feels safer and more secure he is also starting to express more of his wants and desires, likes and dislikes, and this is good, but can also be challenging. For instance, this past week Vova began to bite people when he was unhappy with them or didn’t want to do what they were asking him to do. Ummmm that’s not gonna fly, so we’re gonna have to nip that one! Always something new with our boys…and never a dull moment!

Sasha making Vova smile. Blurry, but getting a good pic of Vova is a monumental task, sooo 🙂

With Vova it’s impossible to know which changes in him are a result of treating the PKU and which changes are the result of living within the love and safety of a family, but regardless, we’ll take the changes. We’ll just keep doing what we’re doing and see how he blossoms. He is definitely the most guarded of all of our boys, so any steps toward relationship that Vova takes are cause for big celebration!

Thank you for supporting us and encouraging us along this journey with Yarik and Vova. They came into our family so unexpectedly, but what a wonderful surprise they have been. They have stolen our hearts and we can’t imagine our lives without them.

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You Are Not Going to Believe This.

Oh my goodness, have I got a doozy for you today. I was trying to think of a clever title, but decided to just go with the obvious. You are seriously not going to believe this story, but I promise it’s true.

I’m not sure if you know this, but we have a team of builders who live here and do all the constant building and repairing on our property. They built the duplex and are now finishing up the barn and making accessible walkways around the property. We have a goal that all the construction on the Homestead will be done in the next three years and won’t that be a grand day! But until then, our building team of 5 men is a constant fixture on the Homestead. During the week they live in the old house at the front of the property and on the weekends they go home to their village about 50km away. They don’t have a ton of interaction with our boys, but they are always kind to them and the boys know them.

So, a few weeks ago one of the builders, a young guy named Vadim, was cleaning out the boiler room of the duplex. The duplex is heated with a wood boiler and every Friday one of the builders cleans it out. In the boiler room was a box of recycled documents from our office set aside to be burned. Vadim saw on the top of the pile of documents a copy of our Yaroslav’s passport and noticed that Yarik’s last name and patronymic were the same as his girlfriend’s. He snapped a photo of the document with his phone and texted his girlfriend, Vlada. “Hey look, this guy has your same last name. Weird, right?” (It’s not a common last name) Vlada looked at the name and birthdate and was shocked to put two and two together: Yaroslav is her long lost brother. I.Kid.You.Not. The girlfriend of our builder is Yaroslav’s sister!!! What the heck even??? It’s like a Hallmark movie!

This is how it all went down. When Yarik was small and it was discovered that he had a disability his mother put him in an institution. He is 8 years older than Vlada and she never met him, but she always knew she had an older brother with a disability. Yarik and Vlada’s mother was/is an alcoholic and her parental rights were removed when Vlada was small and Vlada was placed in an orphanage. She was typically developing, so she was not placed with Yaroslav. When she was 4 years old she was adopted by a good, loving family. Vlada always remembered she had a brother and when she was a teenager she decided to try to find him. She contacted her birth mother and was told that Yaroslav had died. She was too late. We don’t know why the mother told her that because we all know that Yarik is very much alive and well with us here on the Homestead. Imagine Vlada’s surprise when she got that text from her boyfriend! Ha!

The discovery about the relationship was made on a Friday afternoon and that very Sunday Vadim and Vlada showed up here on the Homestead. She just couldn’t wait to meet her long lost brother. Over the past month Vlada has visited Yarik here several times. She comes just to be with him, to sit with him, to get to know him. We don’t know if Yaroslav understands what a sister is, but he 100% understands that Vlada is someone special in his life. He asks for her almost every day and cries when she leaves to go home. He showers her with kisses and basks in her attention. He understands that she is there just for him and he adores her. For our Yarik, who’s need for love and attention is like a bottomless pit, Vlada’s presence in his life is a most beautiful, unexpected gift. And for Vlada to know her brother and to have a safe, warm, inviting place to build relationship with him- well, it’s just all around amazing.

Today we will celebrate Yaroslav’s 28th birthday and his sister, Vlada, will be joining us. He will be surrounded by all the people who love him: his big Wide Awake family and his very own sister. God’s love for Yarik and Vlada is just crazy big and we are thankful to be witnesses to it.

BeLOVE[d]


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Fighting for Ruslan 💪

07/28/2023 Update: Ruslan is in the US right now and will have free surgery in the second week of August! Thank you to all of you who reached out and offered help and leads. Your care means so much to us. You can read more about the plans for Ruslan here.

I know I’ve said it before, but here I am saying it again: our boys are superheroes. They really are! They are survivors. After all they endured while living in the institution, they still enjoy life and have learned to love and trust others, all the while daily overcoming the limitations of their physical bodies. They are forces to be reckoned with.

Our Ruslan is a mega-superhero. Is that a thing? Well, I just made it one. 🙂 He has a foot that is pretty severely deformed, and he has never had a shoe that actually fit, but he never ever complains about it. He has to limp when he walks, which over the years has transformed his hips and spine as he compensates for the limp, but he rarely even complains about any discomfort in his body. On the one hand it’s awesome because it just shows how strong he is. But on the other hand it’s sad, the fact that he has just adapted to the pain and has zero expectation that his body could change for the better. Ruslan has resigned himself to his broken body, but the rest of us have not. We want something better for him and won’t stop looking until we find a way to help.

It is not our practice at Wide Awake/Dim Hidnosti to immediately search in other countries for help for our boys, but to try to use only local resources whenever possible. One of our goals is to create something that can be replicated by Ukrainians in other parts of the country. If we rely too heavily on western help we are creating an unsustainable model that is only achievable with western connections. We want to be a spark of change in the culture here and are always on the lookout for local like-minded medical professionals who want to partner with us to help improve the lives of people with disabilities. At the same time, we recognize that this is an extremely difficult time here in Ukraine and sometimes outside help is what is needed. This is one of those moments.

Over the past four years we have searched and searched and have not been able to find any help for Ruslan here in Ukraine. Doctors don’t want to touch him and physical therapists say it is much too late for anything to be done. We tried to find a place where they could make him some special shoes, but only one company agreed to try and their attempt looked like Frankenstein shoes! I kid you not- they were like props from a horror movie. I think Rus lasted about 5 days before he just refused to put them on. They were so heavy and clunky (not to mention uuuuuuugly). He could barely walk in them. No other companies will even try to make shoes for Ruslan. Last week a PT told us “No one in Ukraine can help you. No one.” Hmmmm not exactly encouraging.

Alright, so we haven’t had any luck finding help here in Ukraine, but we refuse to just sit down and accept that. Rus is a young man and he has his whole life ahead of him. Surely we can do something to improve the quality of that life! If we don’t, his posture will only get worse and I fear that someday he won’t be able to walk anymore at all. We have to stay on this and not let it go.

So, now I’m coming to you, our awesome Wide Awake community. Will you help us search for help for Ruslan? We are looking for knowledgeable medical professionals who can become a resource for us and help us to understand the steps we should take to help Ruslan walk better and more comfortably. I have no idea what a solution for Rus even looks like.

Do we need to try to fix Ruslan’s foot with surgical interventions? If so, where can we do that? We need a surgeon to donate his time and a hospital to donate their facilities. Ruslan is a Ukrainian citizen, but he could easily get a visa to the US, for example, because Jed is his guardian and Jed is a US citizen. Several years ago we got a visa for Boris that way with zero problems.

Is surgery impossible or too big a risk and we need special shoes made? Great! Who can make the shoes and where do we need to go to make that happen? Our current solution is buying whatever shoe we find that will “semi” stay on his foot and then replacing it every 2-3 months because he walks a hole into it. Not to mention he has to stop every few meters and put his shoe back on because only the ball of his foot stays in the shoe.

Is there some sort of nonprofit out there that helps people like Ruslan and we need to start by connecting with them? Great! Send their contacts my way and I’ll get on it.

We have been advised by an American PT and by Ukrainian PT’s that no therapy will help Ruslan’s foot. Everything is fused in place and the foot is not flexible at all. PT is helpful for strengthening his leg and helping with his back, but as long as he limps the way he does, he will have problems with his hips and back. It seems that we’ve got to start with the foot.

If any of you have any connections to share with me I would greatly appreciate it. Please feel free to pass this need on to others. Surely, there’s got to be someone out there who knows how to help our guy. Let’s find that person together!

BeLOVE[d]

If you have any info or leads on help for Ruslan you can comment on this post or email me at kjohnson@wideawakeinternational.org Thanks!

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A Defining Year

Tomorrow, unbelievably, marks one year since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It feels like only yesterday, but also feels like a lifetime has passed since we lived in a land of peace. There has been war in Ukraine since 2014 when Russia invaded the Eastern borders and stole Crimea, but our town remained at peace. We didn’t feel the war in our everyday life. Here on our little Homestead we lived in peace, without fear. Oh, what beautiful, peaceful lives we led. We took so much for granted and didn’t even realize it. Now we are forever changed. This year showed us a lot about ourselves, about our work, about our team and our boys, and about our world. We will never be the same.

Our newsletter should go out tomorrow and I know the anniversary of the war deserves attention, but I just know tomorrow I won’t be in a mindset to deeply reflect. It’s just too painful. I figured I’d get as many of the tears out today as possible. So bear with me as I rip off the barely healing scab on my heart and reflect on this past year.

I sometimes wonder what I did last year on February 23rd, the last day of peace. How did I fill my time? What was on my mind? What plans did I have for the next few days, the next few months? I can’t even remember. When we woke up on February 24th to bombs dropping and our house shaking our old life and plans flew out the window. We had entered a new reality where only the war existed and the rest of the world was as far away as Jupiter. Anytime I think about those first few weeks of war my stomach hurts and tears flow. All the feelings come rushing back: shock, fear, outrage, confusion…How do we live in a time of war? How do we parent our children through this? How do we lead our team through this? How do we keep our children and our boys safe? What is the right thing to do? Do we stay or do we go? If we go we will be physically safe, but how can we leave the men on our team and our boys at Romaniv? If we stay we could die. What if our children die because we stayed- when we could have left? The internal dialogue and conflict were unrelenting. There is no guidebook to living through a war. You just live, one day at a time.

Then there is the time we spent as refugees in Germany. That was a whole lifetime in itself that contains its own pain. To be honest, I still can’t really talk with you about that time. For me, personally, it was the most agonizing, most difficult time of my life. I have no idea which Kim the people in Germany saw…but it wasn’t me. I was not myself and the whole time is like a blur. I know someday I’ll be able to share with you more about that time, but I honestly am just not ready. I’m thankful our bodies were safe and I’m thankful for the people that helped us. I truly am. I have a handful of really beautiful moments there that I will carry with me always. But in general, it was just super rough, for me personally. I know it’s visible in the Youtube videos from that time. I don’t plan to ever go back and watch those. I’m aware I look like death. 😂 Care for the refugee, Friends. They are carrying such deep pain.

Since we returned home to Ukraine in July we have all learned to live in the new normal. We have adapted to life in a country at war and I’m consistently amazed at the resilience of the human spirit. We really are amazingly adaptable creatures. Sometimes I’m even a little concerned at how normal certain things have become that should never be normal for anyone. But, God has given us, our team, and our boys the grace to keep moving forward, despite the war raging around us. We are so thankful for his protection, his grace, and his love for us and this work that he has created.

I have heard people refer to this year as “The Year Russia stole from Ukraine” and boy, they have definitely stolen a lot. They’ve stolen thousands of innocent lives. The death toll isn’t even countable yet in places like Mariupol where Russian troops still hold the city. I’ve read estimates of at least 20,000 civilian deaths in that city alone. One source even estimates as many as 87,000 deaths in the city that a year ago today had a thriving population of over 425,000. We may never know how many lives were lost in that once beautiful city on the sea. The Russians have stolen the childhood of an entire generation. Ukrainian children have seen unimaginable horrors this past year. They spend sometimes hours a day in their schools’ bomb shelters and know waaaaaay too much about different weapons and their capabilities. They know true fear like I never knew as a child- or even as an adult! My heart hurts, thinking of the ways my children have had to grow up this past year. It shouldn’t be this way. Russia has stolen some of the best and brightest from Ukraine. Millions have fled the country and the longer they are away in Europe or the US the less likely it is that they will ever return. Some of the brightest of us have fled, the bravest of us have died, and the rest are left to pick up the pieces. It is a heartbreaking reality.

But- despite all that has been stolen and despite the circumstances that thwart at every turn, we absolutely refuse to let Russia steal our hope. We will not be led by fear. We will not back down. We will not hold back. God is our portion, our refuge, our strength, our hope. The dreams he put in our hearts he will see to fruition- he is even doing that now! Right now, as I am writing this post, Jed is in Romaniv at a committee meeting where they will grant him legal guardianship of Yaroslav and Vova. Today our boys will be ours forever. God is still moving, still making a way and as long as he goes, we will follow.

This year our faith has been tested and defined. Where do we find our hope? Who do we turn to when we are afraid? Do we believe God’s promises to us and our boys? Where does our strength come from? Is our joy reliant on our circumstances? I have failed a million times this past year. I have put my hope in people. I have not chosen joy when things looked bleak. I have relied on my own strength. I have doubted God and his faithfulness. But despite all that, he keeps pulling me back. He keeps showing his love and faithfulness to us, our team, and our boys. He provides all that we need at every turn. He is always there, waiting, loving us first. No matter what may come tomorrow, we will hope in him.

Thank you for loving us and for remembering Ukraine. Victory will come, I’m certain of it, but until that moment we will continue to put one foot in front of the other, saying YES to the next thing God asks of us. Thank you for joining us along the journey. It’s not over yet.

BeLOVE[d]

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