Ukrainian journalist Khrystyna Kotsira shared a personal story about how psychological help became life-saving for her.
This is stated in her post on her personal Facebook page.
In her Facebook post, she admitted that she had suffered a severe blow a few months ago:
"A few months ago, I had an event that knocked the ground out from under my feet. An event that made me stop breathing, sleeping, and eating. It was scary. But there was no way to give up. When I tried to describe my condition to myself, I couldn't. And then one day, in a film about Chernobyl, I saw footage of irradiated people dying. Horrible footage. They looked the way I felt. What they had on the outside, on their skin all over their body — deep ulcers — was inside me."
In the end, she pulled herself together and sought help from a psychologist, although she admits she was skeptical:
"After the first consultation, during which I heard advice to go to a massage therapist, I thought - ugh, I had to go to a psychologist to make an appointment with a massage therapist, what kind of bullshit? But I made an appointment. And now I go regularly. And to a psychologist. And to a massage therapist. I cried at the psychologist because it hurt... But little by little I began to feel how it became easier. How my back straightened. How my breathing returned. And the ability to rejoice. The strength to fight on. I felt the ground under my feet."
Kotsira emphasized the importance of normalizing taking care of your mental health:
"How is it to go to a psychologist, a psychotherapist, or, God forbid, a psychiatrist - are you crazy? Shameful! No, shameless. Is it shameless to go to a traumatologist and put a cast on your arm if you broke it? The same here - if there are cracks in the soul - you need to go to specialists to "put a cast"."
"From a person with ulcers, from a squeezed lemon, I turned into a woman who makes lemonade from the lemons that life has thrown at me. Tasty, healthy, life-giving. And I don't know if I could have done it without professional help. Hardly," the journalist concludes.
In this context, let us recall that in January 2025, 40-year-old Ukrainian investigative journalist, showman, and TV presenter Bohdan Kutepov, husband of Khrystyna Kotsira, received a summons and was mobilized .