Tetiana Kalenychenko, 23, an attractive long-haired brunette and a Ph.D. student in a Kyiv college, had clear plans a year ago to become a religious expert. Marriage was the last thing on her mind. But war and love suddenly burst into her routine life in the spring of 2014, when she went to the war front to write a story about priests.
There she met her Fedir Kalenychenko, a Ukrainian army lieutenant. Just four months later they got married.
Kalenychenko says such rapid decisions are not typical for her but she is completely confident in her choice. She is sure that war helps to figure people out.
“We did not need to date for a long time before marriage because extreme situations reveal a human’s essence at once,” she says.
Talking over the phone was the only way for them to get to know each other better.
“At some point we found ourselves arguing about Prince Volodymyr (of the Kyivan Rus) at 4 a.m. That was the moment I understood how much we have in common and realized that he is my significant other,” Kalenychenko says, shining with happiness.
Psychologists believe that sudden matrimonial decisions take root from the fear of death.
“When facing death at war a person starts to realize that life is fleeting away. The fear of death makes people try everything they have not had the time for,” says psychologist Olena Bohatyryova.
She adds that often a decision to marry during wartime is not fully conscious since it was influenced by fear.
This doesn’t seem to be the case with Azov Battalion fighter Yevhen Sitenko, 25, who lost his right leg in the battle near Volnovakha on Aug. 4, 2014. The next day after the tragedy he met Dariya, his future wife and – he is certain – the love of his life.
The two met in a Dnipropetrovsk hospital, where the young woman works as a hairdresser. She was sent in to shave Sitenko before a surgery.
“I saw her beautiful eyes, smile and fell in love at once,” Sitenko recalls.
On Feb. 10 the couple got married. At the simple ceremony in a registration office the groom was standing on crutches, wearing his black military uniform.
“She loves me despite the fact that I don’t have a leg. Knowing that someone actually needs me feels like heaven,” he says.
While some of the war-born relationships begin with a personal meeting, many and more are developed through long hours of phone conversations.
Fedir and Tetiana Kalenychenko boast their brand new marriage certificate on Aug. 5, 2014.
It was so for Tetiana Shevchenko’s romance with Ukrainian soldier Vitaliy Matiyenko.
Shevchenko, 50, a native of Vinnytsia Oblast and a mother of a 26-year-old son who suffers from cerebral palsy, has been helping the Ukrainian army by delivering them money and food.
Last July she received a call from a grateful soldier who wanted to thank Shevchenko for her help. The two began to chat every day.
“It was then that I realized that Vitaliy was my soulmate but I kept the distance,” Shevchenko says.
When the two met for the first time in the end of November of 2014, Shevchenko’s feeling turned out to be mutual. At their second meeting the soldier proposed.
“I said ‘yes’ immediately because I think it’s destiny. I’ve been waiting for him my whole life,” Shevchenko says, her voice trembling. “The war brought a lot of grief. But if not for the war we would have never met.”
Not all the war marriages are arranged impulsively. Olena Yershova, 29, a senior lieutenant of civil defense service, and major Yevhen Yershov, 29, met through mutual friends and started dating in December, 2013.
The couple planned to get married in March, 2014 yet the war ruined their plans. Yershov went to the frontlines with the first call-up and was wounded near Ilovaysk in Donetsk Oblast at the end of summer. The injury put Yershov on crutches, but it didn’t stop the couple from getting married just a week after. For the ceremony they dressed in Ukrainian military form.
As of middle February, Yershov was about to go back to fighting.
“I don’t want him to go to the frontline, but on the other hand it is his duty as a man. I am proud of him. He is my hero,” his wife says.
Kyiv Post staff writer Nataliya Trach can be reached at [email protected]
