Page 18 - Mar_Apr 2022 Newsletter.pub_Neat
P. 18
PTSD of History: Reflections on War in Ukraine
Yelena Zalkina, MD
“The war has ruined us for everything”
Erich Maria Remarque “All quiet on the Western Front”
“No to war” is now a phrase that can send you to jail for 15 years in Russia. The
word war must be erased from people’s discourse since what is happening in
Ukraine is nothing more than a “special operation”. An alternative reality has
been created along with Orwellian newspeak to describe it.
History seems to repeat itself. I came to US from a former Soviet Union as an adult, escaping
totalitarianism, repressive power and rampant anti Semitism. There was no future for me there. Yet,
growing up in Moscow, I had been nurtured by rich Russian culture, literature and art which I have
always valued. When I arrived to US I grew proud of my bilingual and bicultural identity American and
Russian Jew - “a citizen of the world”.
This has changed in March 2022 when Russia started a war against Ukraine. The war against humanity
and possibly a whole world. Russia is bombing Ukrainian cities, killing innocent people and forcing
millions to run for their lives, creating an unthinkable humanitarian crisis. The picture of destroyed
Mariupol and bombed Kharkov will stay in people’s memory for generations and will be recorded in
history books -that is if humanity still has a future and a history to wright…
Ukrainians have made it clear that they will not give up their land or their freedom. Hundreds of
thousands have joined armed forces to defend themselves. President Zelensky has refused offers of
evacuation and surrender for himself and for his people. The mayor of Kiev Vitali Klitschko, a
millionaire and a boxing champion, has also chosen to stay in Ukraine and join armed forces
alongside with other Kyivlans, grandmothers, teenagers, ballet dancers, and musicians. Husbands
accompany their wives and children in evacuation to safety and return to take place among the
defenders of the bombed and shelled cities. Looks like the whole population is determined to die
rather than be subjected to Russian occupation.
As Ukraine is fighting for its freedom, I catch myself thinking more about Russia then Ukraine. Russia,
I feel is losing its soul or what’s left of it. “Soul” is one of those Russian constructs, not necessarily
carrying any religious connotations, that I have inherited from its culture and literature, signifying
some moral core and high spirit. Despite the loss of life, Ukrainian sole will survive, but it is not at all
clear what will happen with Russian sole.
Perhaps this is a pattern in Russian history, from Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, Tzar Nicholas II, to
Stalin and now Putin (and many in between), of generations of suffering internal trauma, bloodshed,
servitude, terror, exile, imprisonment, and subjugation, resisting autocrats by coups, massacres, and
revolutions, resulting in an unfathomable collective exhaustion, the “PTSD of History”.
Continued on page 19
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA PSYCHIATRIC SOCIETY Page 18 MARCH/APRIL 2022