ELLICOTT CITY, Md. — After navigating through the adoption process for the past five years, Jennifer Ruff and her husband finally had a dream come true when they met 16-year-old Sasha.
Sasha grew up in Ukraine and still lives there in an orphanage but Ruff and her family hosted him for several weeks last year as well as this winter. With his official adoption getting closer, Ruff said Sasha quickly connected with her other children and formed a special bond with the family.
"He just fits into our family perfectly. He is the sweetest kid," she said. "He has the biggest heart. He’s goofy and silly. We were just blown away by how quickly he attached with our family.”
During calls and conversations, Sasha expressed his excitement to see them.
However, concerns about his safety suddenly came up with the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine last week.
"I get a phone call from Sasha and he says, 'Mama, there’s five.' He’s pointing his phone out the window and there have been five shellings," Ruff said. "One of his first messages was 'please don’t tell the little kids what’s going on. I don’t want them to cry or be upset.' I just started crying. You’re just thinking the worst has happened."
For Ruff, the past week has been filled with sleepless nights and worrying about Sasha and other children in Ukraine.
Ruff is now one of a number of parents who have seen adoptions disrupted as a result of the conflict in Europe.
Host Orphans Worldwide (HOW), a nonprofit organization that helps connect orphaned children with families, told WUSA 9 on Wednesday that the attacks against Ukraine have halted adoptions and brought questions over when parents could see their children again.
"There are no government buildings," said HOW family coach Jill Krenzer. "They’re talking about how most of their paperwork is mostly burned up and gone. It’s devastating whether you’re at the end of the process or beginning of it but some people have been in process for years and almost to the end getting their kids home.”
Krenzer said the orphaned children are now needing to spend much of their time in basements and bomb shelters as a precaution against possible Russian attacks.
With many in the country scrambling to get money and supplies, Krenzer said the conflict has also led to issues getting food for the children.
"Their food supply had been already cut back prior to last week but now it’s even more dire," she said. "There’s a lot of logistical issues and the kids are running low on food and water.”
Both Ruff and Krenzer told WUSA 9 that they have been reaching out to leaders in Congress for assistance getting the children out of Ukraine. However, any sort of timeline to bring the children to America still remains unknown.
"Adoption was our focus a week ago," explained Ruff, who hopes exceptions can be made for the children's visas. "Now our focus is how can we get (Sasha) to us safely in these extraordinary times.”
"The strength of these kids is amazing but I can’t imagine how much more trauma they’re dealing with now," added Krenzer.
Host Orphans Worldwide is raising donations that will go toward the team tasked with helping to get children safely out of Ukraine.
For more information on the effort, click here.