Feeling groggy, I opened my eyes as my phone buzzed on the bedside table. It was 6am on 24 February 2022 and, holding the phone to my ear, I heard my sister’s panicked voice.
‘War has started; you must leave Kyiv,’ she wept, and I jolted awake, wondering why she was talking like this.
We were an ordinary family living in the centre of Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital city. Every morning, I’d make breakfast for my son Bohdan, then nine, and daughter Elizabeth, seven, before we headed off on the school run and then I’d go to my teaching job. In my spare time, I ran my own business as a nutritionist.
With my
