Katya was born with leg deformities, heart problems and an appearance that is typical of someone born with fetal alcohol syndrome, her life was hard from the start. After giving birth, Katya's mum was told by a doctor, “Your daughter is sick, it’s better if you leave her’, so immediately she was placed in an orphanage.
Katya is a sweet, modest and gentle girl - rare qualities in orphanage leavers after childhoods in harsh regimes.
Yan and Nadya met Katya in her late teens and offered her help in their support group - suffering severe anxiety and never trusting anyone she declined. Now 26, Katya is still extremely vulnerable and struggles with her disabilities. She has now joined the group and revealed to Nadya why it took her so long...“I wasn’t sure that you’d accept me. I didn’t want to bother you with my problems”.
Clinging to the Hope of a Family
Katya has always held out hope that she'd be reunited with her mum one day. But, at age 20, while in hospital after surgery for her leg deformities, a carer from her old orphanage came to tell her…“The good news is I’ve found your mum. The bad news is she doesn’t want to see you.”
This was a huge blow. She later found out she had a brother who was not interested in meeting and that her dad was dead – her final hope of a family was gone.
Katya told Nadya, “since knowing my mum doesn’t want to see me I’ve had sadness in my heart.” Nadya cried as she told us about Katya’s past, that her deep emotional wounds cause Katya constant pain.
From left to right: Yan and his wife Nadya, their daughter, Katya and Lucia.
A Family at Last
Although dreams of her biological family were over, Katya was welcomed as part of Yan and Nadya’s extended family. They love her and care about her. She lives with Lucia, another member of Yan and Nadya’s group and Nadya is delighted that the girls are reading the Bible together in the mornings!
An Orphan in Poverty
After some bad advice that resulted in Katya’s benefits being stopped she has no stable source of income.
Like many orphan girls she learned to operate a sewing machine. Katya had a job as a seamstress but it was too challenging. She was skilled but slower than the other girls and her confidence was knocked.
“I couldn’t keep up, I felt like a loser” she told Nadya. To encourage Katya, Nadya gave her a list of cleaning jobs at the Transition Home and gave her a blessing as a thank you. And, to restore Katya’s confidence in sewing (and find a way to create some income), Love Russia is supporting her with the cost of materials to make handbags. Katya and Nadya have come up with a design she is confident in making which she hopes to sell locally!
Many factors make life hard for orphan adults like Katya:
• No family to support or comfort them.
• Disabilities that are both physical and mental.
• Poor education and a lack of opportunities.
All these factors destroy confidence and impede their ability to support themselves.
Thanks to Nadya’s love and the resources provided by supporters of Love Russia, Katya’s confidence and feelings of security are growing. Please pray for all our young people with challenging lives like Katya.
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