Gold Medalist Oksana Masters on Growing Up in a Ukrainian Orphanage

so growing up in the orphanage you so you still have like very present memories of that time yeah that's why the last orphanage the other ones I don't because I moved around and lived in three but it's the one that from 5 to 16 you're considered an adult oh right and that's the one I really remember cuz and it was the last year is really what I remember right cuz I was about to turn eight and it's weird how like the smells and the sounds and like it could just re-trigger it's in your body it's crazy right especially like I think they say that smell is the most uh it is the most like triggering memory sense like you can smell things and then just immediately remember things like are what are those smells for you that you smell and you're like Dill like dill weed pickles really because why that was just a really common food that I didn't get it I I don't know why but I smelt it in the orphanage it was always there cuz like my orphanage was the last one was like the other Wing was an orphanage but then it was like a boarding school but not boarding school like we think of a posh type one right in the UK or anywhere and those kids basically their parents paid money to the government and so they would just go and live there and get like room and food and then would go home on vacations or things like that oh I see so they just was a way to help when they couldn't provide for them either but they had a home and were there resources at this orphanage was it like for them yeah but for you yeah not so much not like that no because um I like we did get to eat and maybe this is why like my mom also said like I smelt like Dill for like the first few months because it was in my pores it was just cooked all the time in the food and stuff is that a Ukrainian thing or is that like just specifically at this I think it's a very Slavic thing it is Ukrainian thing and I do I do love pickles that is my still I love pickles so you don't necessarily do have a negative and Juice like pickle juice too right oh my goodness you and my wife will get along so well she's just like sometimes she'll hit me up and go like literally late at night and she'll be like I need you to go to the corner store I need you to get a pickle just and I'm was like is this an IND endu she's like no I just literally need a deal craving calls for a pickle nothing will suffice at all I'll come home at like 2:00 in the morning she goes wake me up I need a night pickle and then I'll chop up a pickle and she'll have a bite and go back to sleep it's bizarre is this like I don't understand what's happening she didn't she wasn't even in an orphanage I don't know what's going on she just loves still pickles but yeah it's a weird thing how it can like trigger those senses but for that specifically you don't have negative connotation with that not with that oh interesting yeah and there's like there's good like there's good memories and bad memories and not like it's not like it was hell 24/7 yeah of course but yeah but were you constantly it probably is difficult to remember especially when you're seven I don't even remember what I know when I was seven but is it were you thinking like oh I'm going to get out of here I'm going to get adopted or did you just think you were going to age out did you have a lot of like cognitive thought about that well I knew I wanted a mom because I saw kids that were um we so they would all put us around for when there were potential parents that were interested in adopting and that's when we got to eat and that's where we got to like actually like have a dress on and they always flop a bow on your head oh really they like dress you up for like the day the day and so you associate like okay so we have to put our best like we have to look cute and be the chosen one and um so I've watched a lot of kids walk like I knew what a mom was I was very aware of that because sometimes there was like harsh conditions there and sometimes when they were really physical I would go into some like some of the caretakers would take me home and so for a night or two to really heal and then would come back to the orphanage and that is those small little moments is where I felt love and Mom yeah of course and I don't know why I knew the word mom like in Ukrainian not in English but and that's all I wanted and that's I was very aware of that do they explain things to the children like oh when like do they explain why you're in an orphanage do they explain no what the context of this is like because it's a bizarre thing to think that you were just growing up in an environment and without being told what's happening you might not know like oh this is what a family is supposed to be yeah this is what grandparents are like this is what traditions are that people do in their families so how was that explain to you and like how did you learn those things it wasn't explains it's just feelings you just like I associate it with I feel safe here MH and so this is what I want and new mom because some of the kids were like oh I'm going to get a mom and then the orphanage of the director of The Orphanage or the caretakers would say like well this is why you don't have a mom because you either look like this or you're a bad girl and they know this they would say that yeah and so like you kind of learn okay but that never worked on me I still got in trouble I never learned that's why I took seven and a half years wa were you getting in trouble and like what I was just CL going in places I was not supposed to be going and sneaking out trying to get food cuz we were so hungry all the time and climbing bookshelves all the time and just like oh you were just wild child yeah like yourself you were active like from the jump you just liked being active I love moving my body and just being physical right and even at that time so at that time this is pre-surgery so you still had one leg that was sort of like bent I guess but yeah was like straight but it was like arked in like a little half to so yeah so I didn't have the weight the weight bearing bone and I didn't pay attention in like anatomy class so I don't really know if it's a tibo the fibia I think it's the tibia is the main weight bearing bone right and the other one looked like a salt shaker it was just sprinkled all over so it wasn't really a fully formed bone so and then my ankles were fused up so I walked on tippy toes with my six toes and um I did have seven surgeries in Ukraine and one of them included removing the six toe and doing the webbing but I totally just lost my train of thought actually getting the surgeries and being able to walk in the orphanage yeah I taught myself how to walk because in theory I shouldn't have been able to walk that's the thing I don't understand like all these impairments but still you're just like I'm going to go climb a because I think it's like this is the thing like Society now sees me as like oh she has no legs and just cuz they can't imagine it so they're like how do you do this how do you what you can like you can go up the stairs you can oh my gosh you can you can go to the bathroom by yourself um and that's the fun ones like do you sleep in your legs and stuff it's like no I don't sleep in my legs are you kidding me but so like they don't see it and it's really really hard in that aspect of it right and so you're kind of like wild in the orphanage did you have friends that you still remember now that like oh we would do these things together we were just like crazy and or like we would do these games or like we would get into trouble in these ways like were there any fond memories like that with with any of the people yes like so I had a really really good close friend there um and and then I had really two close relationships with two of the little boys there too and we were like three musketeers and just like we were the smallest I was the smallest one so I got a lot of piggyback rides but we kind of like I don't want to say like ran that orphanage but we kind of did amongst the kids um but yeah it was just kids stuff just being so curious and just getting in trouble and doing things and I think I was that one that would always take it too far and like they try to talk me like oana let's like don't do this and then nothing good happens from it and then all of a sudden nothing good happened from it and then I would be gone for a little bit and then it would come back right and I think for me it was the that's when I felt seen is when I was getting in trouble H and so I kind of I also love pushing buttons and sitting back and watching I just didn't do a good job with not getting caught so I got caught that's funny yeah like you would push buttons and then instead of running away and seeing you would just stay right there and be like I push these buttons