Hundreds of people were killed under the rubble in Debaltseve. Thus, more than 9,500 victims were killed during the entire war. The summer of 2014 and the winter of 2015 were the worst. There are streets with no still-standing buildings at all.  A lot of roofs were destroyed. Many windows were shattered. Many windows were blown away, even their frames. Our house has been destroyed drastically.

I gave up everything, took my three children, and ran away from the war. They gave us, what they called, the "green corridor" and took everyone out in a fire truck.

However, since we didn't have money, we left not far away, stopped 20 kilometres from our home town, in a dacha village on the outskirts of Luhanske.

As a large family, we were allowed to stay there for free. We have lived here with my mother, brother and sisters for three years. In total, there are 12 of us.

We decided that we would not go back to Debaltseve. We won't be better off there, we've already started from scratch.

Protecting children from war in the new place seemed impossible. Luhanske was also shelled. To protect ourselves from shell fragments, we covered the windows with shields.

My eight-year-old daughter Sveta will never forget about the fighting, trenches, dugouts, and military equipment. She had to see all this every morning when she left the house and went to school. Here is the place where the tank stood. And there was the third…