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Pastors and Leaders Receive Trauma Training and Renewal
Healing, Hope, and A Moment of Calm in the Storm
At a time when daily life in Ukraine is marked by uncertainty and strain, a recent seminar at PID ZAMKOM (“Under the Castle”) offered something rare: space to breathe, reflect, and begin healing.
Hosted at the United Methodist social and spiritual center—purchased with the help of UMCOR contributions—the seminar gathered pastors, church leaders, and families from across Ukraine. While PID ZAMKOM continues to serve as a shelter for displaced persons, it also provides a place of renewal where people can come together to learn, rest, and find peace.
This most recent seminar focused on trauma and stress. For many participants, it was both eye-opening and deeply personal.
Living with Stress, Learning to Heal
Maksym Zlydar, a veteran who served more than two years in the Ukrainian army, attended with his wife, Victoria. Today, the couple lives in Mukachevo with their six-year-old daughter, rebuilding their lives after displacement.
“As a veteran, I’ve struggled with PTSD,” Maksym shared. “I’ve read books and tried to work through it, but I wanted to hear from professionals. This seminar was a chance to learn how to help myself—and how to help others.”
Victoria was struck by one insight in particular: “We learned that stress literally shuts down functions in our body. It’s not just being tired or busy. When you live in constant stress, your body begins to break down.”
For Maksym, the most meaningful part was the balance of knowledge and practice. “Half of each day was for study, and half was for rest and exercises—like breathing techniques. We didn’t just learn something new, we felt something new.”
Rewriting the Story of Trauma
One lesson that especially resonated with Maksym was the idea of “rewriting” traumatic memories.
“When we experience trauma, our brain doesn’t store it like a normal memory. It’s more like a snapshot. That’s why flashbacks feel so real. But if you can rewrite it as a story, it stops being trauma and becomes experience. You don’t heal by forgetting—you heal when you are no longer afraid to recall it.”
For him, this insight was not just theory. “After serving on the front line, I couldn’t sleep because of flashbacks. I tried to forget, but it only got worse. Eventually, I began writing everything down, step by step, turning those memories into a story. Over time, it helped me heal.”
A Shared Experience of Peace
Maksym and Victoria were not alone in feeling the seminar’s impact. Participants came from Kyiv, Lviv, Uzhhorod, and Kamianets, each carrying their own burdens.
Pastor Oleksandr Omelchenko of Ukrayinka, one of the attendees, described the experience as “a world without war.” He explained:
“The goal was to provide information on how the human body works during stress and how you can influence and manage your emotions. I can say honestly—I see how my body has started to react to this prolonged tension. I’m really starting to have problems.”
Like Maksym, Oleksandr appreciated the way theory and practice came together. “It was important for me to understand the science first. Then Dr. Angela’s exercises finally made sense. Simple actions could return the body to calm and normal functioning.”
But perhaps what touched him most was the fellowship. “I haven’t had such a rest for a long time,” he admitted. “It was literally a pleasure to be with those people. Meeting new friends, sharing stories—it felt like family.”
And then came an unexpected gift: handwritten letters from United Methodist church members from the Florida Annual Conference. “It was incredibly heartwarming,” Oleksandr recalled. “This is the first time in my life people I don’t know—people I have never seen—wrote to me. But it felt like my relatives were writing.
A Word About the Presenters
The seminar was led by Dr. Angela Oliver-Burgess and Pastor Marc Ivanchak, who worked together to offer both practical tools and spiritual encouragement. Their teaching took a whole-person approach—caring for body, mind, and spirit—while always pointing back to Christ’s power to bring transformation. They walked participants through topics like how stress and trauma affect the body, the biology of the nervous system, the importance of self-care, and simple, somatic tools for building resilience. Again and again, participants shared how refreshing and timely these sessions were.
Looking Ahead with Hope
For the Zlydars, life in Mukachevo now means seminary studies, service in a local church, and raising their daughter in safety. “Before the war, we served as pastors in Zaporizhia,” Maksym said. “That city is now destroyed, but the people we ministered to carry their faith wherever they are. Here, we hope to continue serving God—and maybe start a new church one day.”
Events like this seminar remind us that even in the midst of war, healing is possible. By combining science, faith, and community, participants found tools to face stress and discovered a rare gift: peace, if only for a moment.
As Maksym put it simply: “We didn’t just learn. We lived something new.”
A Note of Thanks
We are deeply grateful for the witness of people like Maksym, Victoria, and Oleksandr, whose stories remind us that God continues to write new chapters of healing and hope, even in the hardest of times. We also give thanks for the Florida Annual Conference and the Ukraine Team, formed by Florida pastor Rev. Mike Zdorow, whose faithful partnership and generous sponsorship made this gathering possible. Finally, our deepest gratitude goes to the deeply healing work of presenters Angela and Marc.
— Fred Vanderwerf, In Mission Together Ukraine.
This article was generated from recorded zoom interviews with Maksym and Victoria Zlydar found here, and Oleksandr Omelchenko found here.
For those intersted, Maksym is also a vlogger and you can follow him on youtube here.
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