The mental health first aiders fighting back in Ukraine

This was the area of expertise of Nathalie Robelot-Timtchenko, a mental health professional specialising in expressive arts therapy based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who lived in Kyiv from 2014 to 2021.

“When [the invasion] happened, it was around 1am, I believe, on the 24 February for us [in Cambridge], and it was shocking,” says Robelot-Timtchenko. “It was really hard to know how to help, and what would actually be impactful.”

Robelot-Timtchenko sent out a call-to-action on 25 February 2022, seeking mental health professionals who would be willing donate their time providing support to people in Ukraine. She called the initiative First Aid of the Soul from her base in Cambridge. “Within a week we had around 450 sign up,” she says, with volunteers based all over world, many in the US and Canada, but also across Europe, to Japan and Australia.

Like the “Friend. First Aid” team, a lack of resources on psychological first aid was one of the first things that struck Robelot-Timtchenko.

“That was one of our first projects, trying to make our self-help kits,” says Robelot-Timtchenko. “We had quite a large team, maybe 20 professionals working on just gathering different material.” For example, the team collated information on how to soothe your children when you’re in a stressful environment, such as a bomb shelter, with information about maintaining comforting physical touch and using simple words and phrases to discuss the situation and your feelings.

By the first weeks of March 2022, First Aid of the Soul began providing support groups in a school Robelot-Timtchenko had worked in. “By April we were offering training open to different mental health professionals in Ukraine.” One of their first focuses was psychological first aid, followed by therapies involving movement and relaxation such as yoga, before moving into other areas.

Providing in-person support has been a crucial part of supporting Ukraine’s resilience. “Just recently we were in Ukraine in January, I was able to do a workshop with children that have been displaced internally displaced in Ukraine,” says Robelot-Timtchenko. “These kids have been through hell, to say the least, but they still have smiles on their faces. They are still talking about their superhero fans, and the workshop was about finding inner strength and building resilience.

“That is what we’re trying to do, just have a little bit of hope,” she says.