Healing Ukraine's Next Generation - Artem Mazur - CEO Kids of Ukraine

Artem Mazur, founder of Kids of Ukraine, talks with Eric about children's mental health support in wartime Ukraine, from a bomb shelter idea in the first weeks of the full scale invasion to a nationwide network of trauma care centers four years later. On episode 35, Artem explains what it takes to keep that work funded and effective when the crisis has no clear end date. If this one hits home, subscribing and leaving a review helps the show reach people who need it.

Artem walks Eric through the earliest days of Kids of Ukraine, when a group of business partners in a bomb shelter began organizing humanitarian convoys into Lviv. That effort became the Sviti program, now running in four cities and offering trauma informed care, art therapy, and counseling to children carrying the weight of war. He explains why the organization treats mothers as central to a child's recovery, not an afterthought. A therapy and photography initiative called Talk to Me Body helps women who have spent years in survival mode remember who they are outside of it.

The centers stay small by design. Artem explains why healing does not scale the way people assume, and how his team tracks recovery through questionnaires taken at intake and every six months. Kids of Ukraine is now partnering with Georgetown University on a multi year study of what works for children living through a full scale war, data few organizations anywhere have.

Artem describes bringing children to meet veterans there and watching them connect without hesitation, something adults rarely manage as easily. It says more about Ukraine's civil society than any statistic could.

00:00 Introduction
05:44 How the program helps mothers heal
10:52 Why healing works best in small groups
16:24 Partnering with Georgetown to measure impact
22:18 Bringing wounded veterans and children together
27:41 Scaling support for veterans and their kids
33:58 Preventing burnout among the care teams
40:15 Funding as the biggest barrier to growth
46:06 Healing through nature in the Carpathians
52:39 How to support a child for $21

Please support Kids of Ukraine.

Kids of Ukraine Website: https://kidsofua.org/

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