From the author: Description of personal experience of survival in an active combat zone Conflict. Adaptation. Today, I can write about the fact that there was a difficult and difficult period in my life for more than a year. It was extreme, turning into stressful. This is a time of loss, pain, fear, helplessness, powerlessness, tension, fatigue, animal hatred. And the process of adaptation to an abnormal situation called a military conflict is completed for me today. I can analyze the stage of my life I have lived through. Identify losses and gains, limitations and opportunities. I know my coping mechanisms, my resources, my strengths and weaknesses. The hardest thing is fear. There is a lot of it. And for many years to come, I will be careful and attentive to places where, theoretically, there is a threat to my life. And at such moments, fear will often win over curiosity. I do not consider this period of life to be heroic. Honestly, it’s risky and stupid to put your life in danger by staying in a city where peaceful houses are being shelled, children and peaceful adults are dying, old people and disabled people are dying of hunger. This is a completely conscious choice to stay in Donetsk. I was able to survive and help people. I believe that this is my contribution to bringing peace to my city. Many people helped me. You can't handle this alone. This is support and help. Even more precisely, this is recognition of me and my need by my family, friends, acquaintances and colleagues, clients. I received psychological help from colleagues - constant personal therapy, supervision, intervisor and Balint groups. Now there is a new stage in my life - this is an intertemporal period. No longer war and not yet peace. And my psyche needs to adapt again. It's complicated. A list of questions from Sneynar Bryn helped me structure my personal experience. 1. How did the military conflict affect my life? Dictionaries will help me in defining concepts. And so I’ll start with conflict, since this is the beginning. Conflict - (Conflictus - faced) is defined in psychology as the lack of agreement between two or more parties. .In the case of an interpersonal conflict, the parties are understood as individuals or groups, and in the case of an intrapersonal conflict - the attitudes, values, ideas of one subject. In this story, the subject is me. In my case, the interpersonal conflict is a group of military men who invaded my personal space. And I don't agree with this. As a civilian, I was not asked whether I wanted to be a participant in active hostilities. Intrapersonal conflict is a lack of agreement between my attitudes, values, and ideas. Then it turns out interesting. Conflict (conflictus - collided) is the most acute way of resolving contradictions in interests, goals, views that arise in the process of social interaction, which consists in the opposition of the participants in this interaction and is usually accompanied by negative emotions, going beyond the rules and norms. A military conflict is an extreme situation; for a person it is new, unfamiliar and abnormal. And you need to adapt to it in order to survive. The side with a military arsenal can resolve contradictions in its own interests. But I, as a civilian, cannot. Then my only possible strategy for behavior in a conflict situation is adaptation. When one side agrees with the other on everything and has its own opinion, which it does not express. There is a threat of losing my life. What am I left with as a civilian? With an intrapersonal conflict, multiple psychological crises, with psychological traumatic experiences. Crisis (from the Greek krisis - decision, turning point, outcome) - 1) a severe transitional state caused by an illness , stress, trauma, etc.; 2) an emotionally significant event or a radical change in status in personal life. Crises vary in duration and intensity of the crisis state. In psychology there are references to three types: neurotic, developmental crises and traumatic. Psychological trauma or mental trauma or psychotrauma is harm caused to a person’s mental health as a result ofintense exposure to unfavorable environmental factors or acute emotional, stressful effects on his psyche. Often associated with physical trauma that threatens life or violates the sense of safety. Psychological trauma disrupts the normative organization of the psyche and can lead it into borderline or clinical states. At the borderline level, both temporary sensations of discomfort and stable conditions with the presence of altered formations that weaken immunity, performance and adaptive thinking abilities can appear. Long-lasting injuries, massive (catastrophic) injuries, sudden and acute ones can lead to clinical conditions in which the altered states that appear (post-traumatic effect with justification) can cause harm to health, withdrawal from compliance with the norms of a person’s social life (social prestige, the possibility of self-affirmation, respect for others and close people, etc.); on intimate and personal consequences for biologically and personally destructive, leading to psychosomatic diseases, neuroses, reactive states. The destructive power of mental trauma depends on the individual significance of the traumatic event for a person, the degree of his psychological security (strength of spirit) and resistance to certain factors and life situations. Of course, my body decides to survive using the escape method. And I run through the stages of adaptation. Adaptation - (lat. adapto - adapt) the process of adapting to changing environmental conditions. aimed at maintaining the stability of the body. In my case, this is biological, physical, social adaptation. The adaptation process consists of stages: disruption of stability, destruction of the old program, formation of a new program. Incomplete completion of these three stages or getting stuck at the second stage means difficult or incomplete adaptation. Getting stuck is a stop in development at a certain stage, a kind of dead end. Signs of getting stuck are when for a long time there is an increased response to any stress, deterioration in well-being, resumption of old and emergence of new diseases, uncertainty, anxiety, apathy, emptiness. Lack of interest in life, knowledge of the world, desire for development, search for new things, plans for the future. Not an opportunity to dream. Being stuck can move in two directions: Finding interest in life and completing adaptation. The help of another person is needed, preferably a professional psychologist. Stagnation, gradual deterioration of decline, emotional and mental state, PTSD. And in the end, this is what happened: Now I live in a rented apartment. My apartment was damaged. Home is not a safe place for me. The value system is destroyed. I have a new one - one value, myself. Working with clients and surviving in a military conflict, I met my pain, helplessness, powerlessness, learned helplessness, limitations. I met my animal hatred. I, like a predator, am ready to defend myself and my family, I am ready to die, and I am ready to kill. This is a difficult and lengthy process. Emotionally strong and difficult to control. This is a reaction to the enemy. Since in my situation there is no real enemy. It is not clear who they are protecting, from whom, and for what they are fighting. I needed to look for the enemy within myself. And it was found - these are my physical limitations. Difficult work of accepting limitations and finding opportunities and what is necessary for me. The existential level is affected, the deepest one is the threat to life, the fear of losing life. The worst thing for me is that my body will be cold, useless, dead. He won't be able to breathe or eat. Violation of my basic needs. Changing my worldview and philosophy of life. Social status - who am I? Today I live in Donetsk. I have a Ukrainian passport. My constitutional rights have been brutally and grossly violated. My human rights have been violated. I continue to pay taxes, including the war tax. 2. What reasons allowed the start of a military conflict? Different language.