Kostya is now 21 years of age and has been home living with us since October last year.
We have known Kostya for 3 years now. We first met Kostya with the KOI teams in the orphanages in 2005. Latter Kostya came to visit us regularly at our house and we became very close to him, and stayed with us for his last few weeks before he went to the army in December 2005.
Here is Kostya’s story
Kostya lived with his mother and brother till he was 7 years old. He never knew his father, and he has good memories of his mother till this time.
About this time his mother started dating, and with this she started drinking leaving Kostya and his 8 year old brother to fend for themselves more often then not. By the time Kostya was 8 he and his brother had not seen his mother in over 6 months, she had gone out for cigarettes and never returned. Kostya and his brother survived by eating out of the garbage bin and asking neighbours for food. Eventually his neighbours called the authorities and he was taken to the orphanages.
A little while after this, another two kids came to the orphanage. It was announced to all the children and staff, that they were there because Kostya’s mother had killed their mother over an argument over a television set. This made Kostya’s life even more of a struggle.
Within a year the director called Kostya and his brother to her office. She informed them that his mother’s boyfriend had killed her in a drunken fight and she had been buried the week before.
When we met Kostya in 2005, Kostya was 17 going on 18 years of age. One of the first things that shocked me was Kostya shared with us how he was still waiting for God to send him a new family, that this had been his prayer for over 5 years and when we come along it was the first time since his mother had left he had been hugged or felt loved in any way.
In the short time Kostya stayed with us before being sent to the army in December 2005 a bond was formed an a love grew that I do not know how to explain, and my heart really broke as he went of to the army.
The army for Kostya was very a hard time for him. During the first 6 months we wrote letters regularly and Kostya would send us the most amazing drawings, but they were slow in reaching each other so after Kostya had been in the army 6 months I really felt strongly we need to go the main land to visit him. While we were there we brought him a mobile phone and this gave us a daily link through sms to pray for him and encourage him.
While Kostya was in the army we returned every 6 months to visit him to encourage and uplift him.
Now Kostya has been home for the last 9 months. He has been living in House of Grace and Hope and we have seen Kostya grow a lot. He now has work, he goes to church and has joined the music team in the church and youth group in our house. In his free time he likes to draw and we hoping that we will be able to help use his talents and gifts he has been giving as a future career.
