“It gets harder and harder to say goodbye each time,” says a tearful Vitaliia Atamaniuk in her Victoria home, contemplating her husband Oleg’s imminent return to war-torn Ukraine.
An all too familiar feeling for the couple, who have had to adjust to life living in countries thousands of kilometres apart, after the war in Ukraine began on Feb. 24 2022.
“It feels hard, but … I feel better when I know my family [can] stay alive in a safe place, it’s really important,” says Oleg, who has been able to visit his family in Canada only a handful of times in the past 29 months.
Fleeing the war with her mother and two young children Olusia and Markiian – who were five years old and three months old at the time – Vitaliia arrived in Greater Victoria in September 2022.
“It was a so scary time,” said Vitaliia. “Initially it was extremely hard because it's so far from home, more than 10,000 kilometres. We didn't know what to expect.”
Oleg stayed behind to continue working as a surgeon and teaching at the national medical university in the family's hometown – the western Ukraine city of Ivano-Frankivsk.
“I must stay because we have a lot of different patients and half of my hospital is civilian and other half military … I work in both parts,” he said.
“He's so patriotic,” says Vitaliia. “If we didn’t have kids I would stay in Ukraine too. I'm not thinking about my life, I'm just thinking about our kids' lives.”
Afraid for her husband left behind, Vitaliia says Oleg was equally concerned for her and their children when they arrived in Greater Victoria. “He was afraid about us because I have two small kids and it was [an] unfamiliar country for us, new culture, new people.”
But with the safety of her children her top priority, Vitaliia focused on helping them settle into their temporary home at the ‘Ukrainian Safe Haven’ in East Sooke, a former 82-acre resort property, offering accommodation to dozens of families.
The family lived there for more than a year, grateful for the hospitality of the owners Brian and Sharon Holowaychuk, who Vitaliia describes as part of her “Canadian family.”
“It's a beautiful place, so I feel that I'm in a safe place and there were a lot of Ukrainian families there,” she says.
Fast-forward to 2025 and Vitaliia lives in Victoria, working in an administrative role for Island Health at the Royal Jubilee Hospital. A far cry from her career as a general surgeon at the Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University, but Vitaliia is grateful to be working in a medicine-related field.
Now eight and three years old, the Atamaniuk children have settled into life in Canada. Youngest child Markiian, can speak both English and Ukranian – with a Canadian accent. Their daughter Olusia is now in Grade 2 at school and can speak English fluently.
When asked how it feels to watch his children grow up from a distance, Oleg cannot put his feelings into words, only able to reiterate again the importance that his family are safe from the war.
Daily video calls have helped Oleg stay connected to his family in Victoria, but with a 10-hour time difference, Vitaliia says he has missed key moments in their lives, such as Markiian’s first steps and his first tooth.
“The first everything,” she says.
For the children it has been difficult being apart from their father, especially Olusia, who Vitaliia says is a ‘daddy’s girl’.
“Initially it was so hard because they have such a strong bond and connection,” she says. "But we tried to care of her … because she's so sensitive.”
But the family are grateful for what they have. Their home in Ivano-Frankivsk is still standing, for other Ukrainians staying in Greater Victoria, the story is different.
“They have lost everything,” says Vitaliia about the Ukrainians she has befriended in Canada.
“You work all your life … for home, a car … one day you lose everything,” adds Oleg. “But it's better than you lose life or health.”
While Ivano-Frankivsk is more than 1,000 kilometres from the front line of the war in the east of the country, the city is not immune from Russian rocket attacks.
“One day there was a rocket attack when I called him … it was loud explosion,” Vitaliia recalls. The target was an electrical substation, says Oleg, 30 kilometres from their house.
The support of her parents – her father recently arrived from Ukraine – her children and the Greater Victoria community brings Vitaliia some comfort.
“Vancouver Island people give us the feeling that we are not guests, we are like Canadian people, so we feel that we are at home,” she says.
The couple have also formed close bonds with the Langford humanitarian group, Vancouver Island Supports Ukraine, who will make their fourth trip to the battle-scarred country in March to deliver much-needed aid.
As a trustee of the children’s hospital in Ivano-Frankivsk, Oleg has collaborated with the group to help establish a breast milk bank for premature babies.
Oleg describes their support as invaluable and “amazing.”
“Without support from different people, from different countries, we lose our country,” he says. “We must work every day to save it.”
As the Atamaniuk family reflect on the third anniversary of the day Russia invaded Ukraine, their thoughts go to the thousands of lives lost during the war.
“It's really hard … we lose the best Ukrainian people,” says Oleg. “Our colleagues, surgeons … it’s really good people.
“In the next weeks, next month, next day, we don't know what will be happening,” he adds.
But while the war continues, Vitaliia is hopeful for its end, and the day she and the children can return home. Something she often yearns for.
"But then I remind myself why I am here," she says. "The main reason I'm here is the kids' safety. This sacrifice is for them."
