Greensboro Reporter

Since last week, High Point resident Shannon Newby, 44, has been watching in horror as Ukraine, the homeland of six of her adopted children, has been attacked by the Russian military.

Newby's love for the country and its people began in the 1990s, thanks to her grandmother, Nova Dennis, who served as a missionary in Ukraine at the time. Later, as a teenager, Newby's family hosted eight members of the Ukrainian choir.

In 2017, Newby began adopting children with Down syndrome from orphanages in Ukraine. Each time, she'd walk the streets and adapt to the Ukrainian lifestyle.

"It breaks my heart, because I have six children from Ukraine," Newby told the News & Record. "I've walked those streets, and I remember all those places. They've attacked the airport at Kyiv, and I brought every one of my adopted babies home through that airport. It's just devastating to see what's happening there."

While Newby's six children -- Nicholas, Elizabeth, Sophia, Emma, Hayden and Madeline -- are all too young to understand what's happening, she has kept in contact with their birth parents, who are filling her in on the situation. Nicholas' grandfather, who is in his 60s, is preparing to fight for his country.

"These people, we consider them extended family, and there's nothing I can do to help them," Newby told the News & Record. "It's a very helpless feeling. You want to think it's all a dream, or a nightmare, but it's actually a reality."

Newby worries not only about her children's extended family but also about the other orphans who are still living in orphanages in Ukraine.

"The Ukraine that I knew doesn't really exist anymore," Newby said. "The whole world changed for Ukraine in hours, and now it's so hard to look at places you've walked and things you've experienced, knowing they're not safe anymore. We always felt safe there, but it's not like that now. And it's sad, because my children may never get to see their homeland."