Children who have seriously ill the brother or sister, quickly grow up and feel unnecessary, they are also called the shadows of the survivors. Report from where they are returning themselves

The wool is the center of psychological and social rehabilitation of children who have suffered serious illnesses. He is in the pine forest of the Vladimir region.

Here, according to the stories of the volunteers, last year there was such a case: a girl with a left -handed hemiparesis came for a shift - she did not function the entire left side of the body: leg, arm, face. And she met a boy who had a right -hand hemiparesis. The guys were from different groups, no one introduced them specifically, and it was unexpected when they agreed on a disco in a dance. People would not have understood anything uninitiated, but in the "wool" everyone - both children and adults - got into their eyes: they found each other. I was told that if this situation was not there, it had to be invented as a symbolic place for this: here they always find strength, friendship, some essence. So the volunteers told me and said that the programs are designed to rehabilitate not only the ill -ill children, the shifts are carried out both for their families and separately for the Siblings, the so -called sisters of the children who have cancer are called.

The center was created by the type of network of rehabilitation camps of Hole in the Wall, which have proven itself in many countries of the world. It began to build it in Russia in 2012 by a businessman and philanthropist Mikhail Bondarev. While the construction was going on, the children were accepted for free for rehabilitation in the VKS -Country Rest House, located about two kilometers from here. At his invitation, the leading world rehabilitologists came here at his invitation. Fullly the “wool” opened in 2015 - 26 log houses, a modern medical center, which is called the “House of the Great Plantainer”, the first inclusive rope park, stable, apiary in Russia ...

Now in the "wool" a change of teenage siblings. “Teenagers are dangerous. From hormones they are like terminators, ”says one of the heroes of the cartoon“ Gravity Folz ”. And I think on the way about the “Terminators”, which, it may seem, are that the closest and dear people, mom and dad, are lifted up, because they often don’t see them point blank, they don’t react to successes and failures - all, without a trace, is focused on a sick brother or sister. And the sibling of an important, significant, native and sometimes even a hyper-beeping pet suddenly turns, at best, into a robot-assistant, urgently and unquestioningly fulfilling any instructions, or, in the event of the worst, in a burden

- A child who has long and seriously ill should finally recover - both physically and psychologically. And the Siblings have all the difficulties - psychological. In professional literature, they are called the "shadow of the survivors."

They, without physical diseases, are sometimes in their mental state in an even more difficult situation compared to sick children.

When a brother or sister gets sick, sibling, as it were, gets into the ice hole and drowns in it. And the option of a regular conversation with him does not work - it must be enough and pulled out, ”the clinical psychologist, who then worked as the director of the rehabilitation programs of the Shereudar Center, Vladislav Sotnikov, told me two years ago.

It was just an interview with a specialist - I did not see how the “shadows of the survivors” from the “hole” were pulled out. And I’m not sure what I saw now, but perhaps I realized what the volunteers working with them feel and what they feel and believe.

Turnie. Atrium

Already literally a few steps from the entrance, I am met by the coordinator of the projects of the Sheredar Foundation Dasha Plostkova with an unexpected request - to put on a hat or at least raise the hood. While I am mentally counting how much time has passed since the last time I was treated for such a proposal, Dasha explains the situation. All adults outside the premises on the territory of the “wool” should look exactly as they demand that teenagers look like: no short socks that expose ankles, a mandatory headdress - because winter. Cold.

We enter the heat, and I understand right away why this building is called an atrium - in modern architecture they mean a multi -bearing space, and there is really an incredibly many light here. Following me, the guys enter - many of them are taller than volunteers, well, noisier, of course, a thousand times. In a split second, the room where they rent outer clothing begins to seem narrow, but they do not linger here for a long time - they begin the “turntable”. This means free time, and there are many spaces in which they can choose something for themselves.

- For example, there is the best relaxation there - you can lie, drink tea, tug for cartoons, films, and there to play. It can be rehearsed in the concert hall, and here it is to be attached, ”the volunteer, or Sheri, explains to me (as they are called here), Lesha Shulga. He might not have pronounced the last phrase, because it is difficult not to notice music - the volunteer in the hat shows the guys how to play the drums, and they are selflessly knocking on them.

Leshe Shulge is 25 years old, he is from Orenburg, studied at the institute at the Faculty of Programming, but did not graduate, says that he “pulled out music”, and he has his own rock band “Ocean of Reality”. He arrives at the “wool” for the fourth time, and now he has another role - the master of the rope park. He says:

- Here are the guys from 13 to 17 years old, and here they are the rope park so seriously, boldly and quickly pass, as I can’t even. In general, at the beginning of the shift, I am always a little scary: the first level of height is 3-3.5 meters, and the second is 7! Then you get used to it. But at first I am even scary at the lower level, and they are immediately on the upper one - and go, as there is Kipling: "Mongoose are not afraid for longer than one minute ..."

- All like that? I clarify

It turns out that no, two were uncomfortable. “Ok,” they told them, “support the rest from below,” and they supported quite joyfully. They will want to rise, but for now, it means that they are not time for them. There was a girl who overestimated her capabilities - when she rose, apparently, did not expect that she would be so high, and froze.

“I see - she has tears,” says Lesha, “talked a little.” Then I say: "Come together?" She immediately: “Come on!”, - and we went together. I always tell the guys that fear is normal, this is a sense of self -preservation, and everything is in order. They say about them-“a generation of snowdrops”, they are and, however, more vulnerable than we probably were.

Why did he decide so? I saw on the first day of the shift that many guys taller than he himself, that they behave too relaxed and loudly, very mischievous, and thought it would be difficult. And in the evening of the same day, the guys sat down to watch the new cartoon "Klaus", and in a sad moment many burst into tears.

“I was released,” says Lesha, “it became warm in my soul.” Cool people came to us, very alive, they know how to feel, empathize.

"Friends, are you sick?"

The next morning - firing from onions, the master I noticed yesterday - such a cheerful guy in a costume of the pink dragon moved in the atrium from one party to another and was accepted with a bang everywhere - no one wanted to let him go. During the break between shooting, I find out that the Dragon is the name of Maxim Kapugin, he is from Moscow, he is 21 years old, studies in the 4th year of Bauman MGTU on the designer of missile engines. And when he was 15, he fell ill with lung cancer and got back after recovery to rehabilitation in the Irish camp “Barretstown”, which in many respects “wool” was created in many ways.

“These, of course, are different centers, each with their own individual characteristics, but what they are completely similar to is an atmosphere,” says Maxim.

-I was shocked when after the streets of Moscow, in Altufevo, where someone would send you for no reason, rude, pushing, here suddenly everything seems to you incredibly happy.

And at first you are waiting for a catch, but this continues and continues, and at some point the switch clicks-you are in a fairy tale. Everyone is ready to help anything and at any time - the attack of complete confidence, security. This is what I now want to convey to our guys.

... It was 2017, there was no pandemic yet, and for some reason, children in masks aroused hatred and disgust-some kind of infectious, incomprehensible. It was absolute savagery. Children in masks, who have stood several sessions of chemistry, just defended themselves from the rest, because they have immunity at zero. Maxim remembered only one person in Altufevo, who reacted to him at that time humanly.

“It was a guy in a piercing, all in tattoos,” he says, “and with such sympathy I turned to me:“ Friends, are you sick? ” I nodded, and he: "Well, health to you!" And now I remember that.

Why did he choose the costume of the pink dragon? This Kigurumi was here, he saw him and realized that he wanted to be in him - that’s all.

“But still, why did you want to be in this suit?”

“It’s easy to say that you can look like you like and be in anything, this is not the point.” Do not be afraid to be funny. Here, look what the elders were shot from onions now, - Maxim answered me

Before starting shooting, one of the guys pouts balls and paints them, and someone depicts pictures on posters. There are dreams there. They believe that if you get into them from the bow, everything will come true. And there are fears: you will hit - win them.

I go to the wall with already shot posters. Pieces of 17–20 tracks from arrows next to headphones and gadgets - these are dreams, probably. And there are a lot of shots at Covid and some bloody eyes. Fears?

“Bloody eyes were many times more in the early days,” said Maxim. “I don’t know, however, what it means,” and only he was going to continue the thought of how the guys from the younger team began to enter the hall - their time came to shoot.

He cut himself off at a half, apologized and went to the children, waving his pink dragon tail on the move.

-I somehow heard in the atrium the conversation of the boys who were dressed in costumes of different heroes, and one of them, dressed up in a mermaid, suddenly nervous for some reason: “Look, we were only dressed up here!” - Later, a graduate of the Kursk Medical Institute, a psychologist, assistant director for work with Sheri and medical volunteers Katya Tinyakova told me. - And the guys in response to him: “What are you? Do you look cool, you can’t hold your tail? " And everything is drowning in laughter, friendliness everywhere - this is the magic of the "wool".

“In this magic, you see how children change right before our eyes,” Volunteer Lera Kajhura continued the topic. -We have a girl from Bryansk, she came here so tense and intimidated that it seemed that she was scared to even just say something. She was silent all the time. Gradually thawed, and then she had a real benefit - she came out alone in front of the guys on the theater circle and showed a very steep scene. And after that, everything went differently with her. She began to participate in everything, joke, and she was no longer afraid to be funny. -And, thinking, she decided to add:-We somehow dined in the dining room, and suddenly two guys got up, began to make a wave. Then the third child, the fourth, stood up, and literally 40 seconds passed, as absolutely everything stood up - that is, 60 people suddenly united.

So it was possible

A concert of volunteers begins, unexpectedly two of the teenagers defiantly rise from places and leave the hall. To be honest, I expected that one of the adults would now pitch at them: “Now in place! Who allowed?! "

But nothing of the kind happens. I go out after the boys and see them talking with other volunteers. Fashionable recently the question: "So it was possible?" - In relation to this situation, it surprises all the volunteers that I ask him. Collective answer: “If people now want something else, why can't they go out? Of course, there are some obligatory things: you have to get up, you have to come to breakfast, but the concert is not included in the mandatory program. Not interesting? Let them go to where it is interesting, it's normal! ”

“This means only that they need something else,” the 19-year-old medical volunteer Andrei Andreevsky adds their answer to the general answer. He replaced the Siblings not by chance, he himself was once exactly in the same position. Mom was in the hospital with his one -year -old brother Vitalik for almost a year and a half. Andrei came to the “wool” for the first time, when he was only 10 years old, and remembers his childhood sensations - here no one is biased to anyone, there is no self -interest ...

“The Sheridar was then only built, almost in the neighborhood of us, I myself come from the cocks of the Vladimir region,” Andrei told me. -Thanks to my dad, I did not feel such a very strong blow from what happened, he somehow convinced me that everything would pass and we would handle it. But still, the “wool” strongly strengthened me in childhood, and I really wanted to come here by a volunteer when I grow up.

I now have adolescents 12-13 years old, I see that many of them most likely first encountered the fact that they are seen and heard, pay attention.

This is the most important: show them how important and needed they

Why did Andrei become a medical volunteer and walks along the “wool” with a first -aid kit? When a little brother fell ill, mom began to read a lot of medical books, and he also became interested in this. He entered after the 9th grade to a medical college, now he is already studying in the last, fourth year. Mom has a technologist, dad welder, and he works as a nurse in the neurology department of the Central Kovrov hospital in the Vladimir region and plans to study further to become the first doctor in the family. He says that he will now come to the “wool” annually, because he succeeds-in his team there is not a single teenager who, during the shift, would not have changed for the better: everyone has learned something, became relaxed and friendly. And that the new generation, despite the small age difference with it, is very different - they are less conflict and never even fight. From what he would definitely remember, he called me the evening “whispers”, where the teenagers are frank with a burning candle, and a meeting with the founder of the wool of the wool Bondarev.

“I just could not even imagine before that the businessman could be so sincere.” And that, with all the exactingness, he can talk about his staff with respect, as if it were about his family members, ”he explained.

“The volunteers who were children in our rehabilitation,” my colleagues told me about this in Europe and the USA, and now our guys have grown up and came to work to us. These are personnel of special quality, they see the situation from the inside and can explain to others something important, invisible.

In general, I always meet with volunteers, these are amazing people, I love them very much, ”the founder of the Sheredar Foundation and the BKC-IH Foreign Language School, Mikhail Bondarev, later told me. - You know, I had such a period when I went to the dilapidated temple of the temple every Sunday. In the cold, it was very cold to stand there, I had to dress warmly so as not to freeze, but there I felt a divine spirit. Then, when everyone was repaired there, it went, and I stopped going there.

So it happens with people, from someone it seems to emanate divine music, from someone-no.

When I meet with volunteers, I have the feeling that the Divine Spirit is in the air, and at the same time I understand, of course, that they are all with their worries, sins, and no one, like me, is not a saint, but this feeling remains, and I always meet with them, I have not yet missed a single change in the nine years of the center of existence. I'm talking, answering questions. And this time it turned out to be such a good friendly conversation, which rarely happens where it happens. And he was about everything ... They somehow grow very quickly, and I want them to be successful in life. I decided to open a free school for them, learn to create my own business. We will give all the skills on the basis of the practical experience that I and my company "Internet House" have.

"Julia, are you a homophobic?"

Mikhail Bondarev never tries to start talking with children, he believes that there are more trained people for this, he trusts his specialists. Do volunteers talk to children? Are they talking about the misfortune that happened in the family, about a serious illness of brother or sister, about the state of parents?

- We ourselves do not start such a conversation, but it happens that a teenager begins to tell, he needs it, he wants to speak out. Most often, he does it alone, he cannot be interrupted. But sometimes someone says, because this is that this is already a simple topic for him, a household conversation, which is not for everyone to be such, but he starts it at all, it happened even at dinner. And there is no longer any confessional note. But not all children can and want such a conversation, many are not ready, they are not easy. In this case, we do not interrupt, do not shout “stop” ”, but simply try to translate the topic softly. Because it is already, perhaps, the possibility of attracting attention - sometimes, especially at the very beginning of the shift, adolescents think that Sheri can only listen to him in this format, they only want this, and all children want attention, especially here, when there are more than adults. Они неосознанно хотят выцепить свою долю и говорят про болезнь… Здесь важно дать понять ребенку, что вообще-то можно не только об этом поговорить, у нас много разных тем, и мы точно можем их найти вместе. И тут наши игры, рассчитанные на знакомство, все, что мы отрабатываем на тренинге, очень нам всем помогает.

Вот такой монолог в ответ на мой вопрос произнесла волонтер Юля Фадеева — девушка, которая самое себя называет динозавром «Шередаря». Она приезжает сюда работать с 18 лет, сейчас ей уже 25. По первому образованию она актриса театра и кино, по второму — нанотехнолог, а по третьему — экономист и работает в сфере коучинга. У нее уже девятая по счету смена в «Шередаре», и ее подопечные — команда самых старших ребят, которым по 17. Говорит, что все они «толеранташи». Это значит, что «Шередарь» — свободная территория от всех триггерных тем, таких как религия, сексуальные меньшинства, политика…

— То есть вы этих тем вообще не касаетесь?

— У нас всего восемь дней, и мы не хотим их тратить на суперконфликтные ситуации, к которым могут привести триггерные темы. Подростки же в хорошем смысле провокаторы, которых бывает довольно сложно остановить. Тем более — старшие, они, например, сегодня меня спросили, гомофоб ли я? Вот прямо так: «Юль, а ты гомофоб или нет?» Не прикрытая ничем детская провокация, они любят вводить в замешательство. Им, например, хочется сказать матерное слово, и вот они уже произносят первую букву и смотрят: когда ты скажешь «стоп»? И вот уже вторую букву тянут, и пока ты не остановишь, будут потихоньку произносить слово.

— И здесь толерантность ваша заканчивается?

- No! Мы стараемся заменить слово на похожее, но приличное, а на триггерный вопрос — спрашиваем, для чего эта информация? И даже для самих себя вдруг понимаем, что вообще-то можно и без этого прожить — не причисляя себя к чему-то.

Чего хотят волонтеры от сиблингов? Собирательный ответ: пусть ребячатся, хулиганят и свою отвагу применяют на простых и добрых вещах.

Слишком много на них наложили ответственности и обязанностей в связи с болезнью в семье другого ребенка. Им нельзя было побыть даже чуточку плохими — пусть восполнят это здесь, пусть хотя бы здесь не будут «удобным ребенком», а будут — просто ребенком. Можно дерзить, показать обиду из-за какой-то ерунды — это нормально.

Из-за комплекса вины сиблинги взрослеют очень рано — вот что ненормально. Рак слишком долгая болезнь, и ребята, в семье которых заболели брат или сестра, не успевают побыть детьми. Многие в разговоре вспомнили девочку, которая рассмеялась так, что чуть не задохнулась. А потом призналась волонтерам, что она вообще впервые рассмеялась за полтора года.

— Вчера у нас мальчик разрыдался, — рассказывает Юля Фадеева. — Он приехал позже, чем другие ребята, и боялся заплакать, это было видно. Тогда ему взрослый человек предложил поплакать вместе, сказал, что это нормально, не правда, что мужчина не плачет. И мальчик, поначалу улыбаясь, вдруг буквально разрыдался. И все ребята его понимали, никто не подтрунивал. И такое впечатление иногда, что за воротами «Шередаря» им никто не говорит простых и важных вещей, хотя сейчас везде куча пабликов с модными психологическими цитатами, и все это репостят направо и налево. Все «ресурсные», все в «моменте», но мне кажется, что от этого изобилия теряется что-то. А нужно создавать им ситуации успеха, пусть даже они и будут выглядеть наигранными. Потому что подростки расцветают от успеха, — и мальчики, и девочки, — у них просто невероятный в этом дефицит.

«Терминаторы» расцветают? «Тени выживших»?

- Yes! — почти что кричит в ответ Юля. — Потому что внутри они все мудрые, сильные и добрые, мы же видим это. И поэтому я сегодня абсолютно искренне сказала мальчику: «Степа, какой же ты у нас красивый!» А он изумился: «Кто?! I???" Не говорят им этого, не дают почувствовать себя нужными, красивыми и любимыми. Это не к родителям, не к школе, это ко всем вопрос: почему у нас дети так зашуганы?

Мы сидим в Атриуме, и после вопроса Юли я перевожу взгляд на детей, которые сейчас носятся, хохочут, бьют в барабаны. Ни одного «зашуганного», и нет «теней». Немножко все-таки «терминаторы» — это да, но добрые и очень веселые.

Шел седьмой, предпоследний день сиблинговой смены в «Шередаре».