For seven years after Russia’s initial invasion of Ukraine in 2014, I lived in the city of Severodonetsk in the eastern Donbas region. I started a family there.
Russia’s war has since claimed the apartment we lived in for the first five years; the new home we barely had time to enjoy on a street lined with horse chestnut trees; the resort beneath the pines at nearby Kreminna where we were married; the maternity ward where our daughter was born; my office; my wife’s alma mater; our favourite Georgian café, run by refugees from North Ossetia; the big supermarket we used for the weekend shop and both corner shops we ran to for last-minute ingredients.
Practically everything we knew in the areas of Donbas that were controlled by the Ukrainian government before February 2022 is now a shell-pocked ruin.
