Psychological Assistance Center for Children Opened in Kharkiv Oblast

The Center for Children and Parents was opened in Vysokyi near Kharkiv, where children and parents can get free individual psychological consultations or participate in group therapeutic and psychosocial activities.

During the opening, various workshops were organized for kids, where everyone could show their creativity and make a postcard, play games and taste ice cream.

“Creativity is a natural source of recovery for children. Because of the closed schools, we feel that kids lack communication. That’s why we try to create a safe space for them as much as possible, so they can speak freely and develop communication skills: talk about the events they have experienced, their emotions, etc. In our center, we try to teach self-help techniques through various games and communication,” says Mariana Bugayevska, a team leader and psychologist at the center.

The Voices of Children charitable foundation opened the space, which provides psychological and psychosocial assistance to children and parents affected by the war.

The foundation has been operating in the Vysokyi community for eight months. During this time, the center staff organized three sets of groups for psychological support. Each set included 15 groups with about ten people.

The mental health program focuses on Children and War and Safe Space. It helps to build children’s stress resistance in the unstable situation in Ukraine and work separately in the psychosocial area, where they conduct various workshops and crafts.

“No child should be left with the trauma of war. The main goal of our foundation is to protect the rights of children and to ensure that the war does not take away childhood from our children,” Alyona Chyryk said, coordinator of Vysokyi village branch of the Voice of Children charity foundation.

This point in Vysokyi is the first location in the Kharkiv region. There are also two in Kharkiv: psychological and psychosocial classes for displaced children from Kupiansk and locals are held in dormitories there. In addition, the organization worked in various villages in Kharkiv region.

Olena Rozvadovska, the founder of the Voices of Children charitable foundation, has been volunteering to support children from Donetsk and Luhansk regions since 2015. Then, in December 2019, she registered the foundation, which now has branches in 13 regions of Ukraine.

See also

• Women support space opened in Kharkiv. The project aims to create a safe place to provide comprehensive assistance to women and girls in a crisis.
• Russian shelling affected 3198 educational institutions in Ukraine. Kharkiv region is one of the most damaged in terms of destroyed educational institutions.