Since the start of the war in Ukraine, love and parenthood seem distant for those who remained

Sitting in a wine bar in kyiv on a Saturday evening, Daria, 34, opens a dating app, scrolls down, then puts her phone away.

After spending over a decade in committed relationships, she has been single for a long time. “I haven’t had a real date since before the war,” she says.

Four years of war have forced Ukrainians to rethink almost every aspect of their daily lives. This includes more and more decisions about relationships and parenting – and these choices are, in turn, shaping the future of a country in which marriage and birth rates are falling.

Millions of Ukrainian women who left the country at the start of the full-scale 2022 invasion have now built their lives and established relationships abroad. Hundreds of thousands of men are also missing, either deployed in the military or living abroad.

For the women who stayed, the prospect of meeting someone to start a family seemed more and more distant.

Khrystyna, 28, says it is visible that there are fewer men. She lives in Lviv, in the west of the country, and is trying to meet a partner through dating apps, without much luck.

“A lot, I would say most [men] “I’m afraid to go out now, in this situation,” she said, raising her eyebrows. It refers to men of fighting age who spend most of their time indoors to avoid conscription teams roam the streets of Ukrainian cities.

As for the soldiers, “many are traumatized today because most of them – if they came back – were in places where they experienced a lot,” she says.

Daria feels much the same way. “I only see three options here,” she says, listing the types of men she believes are accessible to women like her.

First there are those who try to avoid conscription. Someone who can’t leave the house is probably “not someone you want to build a relationship with,” Daria says.

Then there are the soldiers, forced into long-distance relationships and receiving sporadic visits from the front. With them, Daria warns, “you make a connection, and then he leaves.”

The remaining option, she adds, is for men under 25. But those aged 22 and under can still freely leave the country, and Daria says they could take off at any time.

None of this pleases him.

Closer to the front lines, many active-duty men are also giving up on the idea of ​​starting a relationship. Uncertainty, they say, makes long-term commitments irresponsible.

Ruslan, a soldier serving in the Kharkiv region, knows the promises he can make are limited. Beyond visits once or twice a year, flower deliveries and the occasional phone call, he asks: “What can I really offer a girl right now?”

“Promising a wife or a fiancée long-term plans is difficult,” explains Denys, a 31-year-old drone operator, in a voice message sent from his post in the east of the country. “Every day there is a risk of being killed or injured, and then all plans will come to nothing, so to speak.”

The consequences of these disruptions threaten to impact Ukraine’s future.

In many ways, they already have. Since the start of the invasion, the number of marriages has declined sharply, from 223,000 in 2022 to 150,000 in 2024.

Ukraine has also seen a rise in deaths, huge emigration – more than six million people have left the country since 2022, according to a UN estimate – and a sharp decline in the birth rate.

All of this leads to a dramatic decline in population, which leads to a shrinking workforce and a slowdown in economic growth.

Oleksandr Hladun, a demographer at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, describes these trends as the “social catastrophe of war.”

And this follows the decline of Ukraine’s population between 1992 and 2022, from 52 million to 41 million, due to a high mortality rate, migration and falling birth rates.

Birth rates fell even further during the conflict. In 2022, the numbers were partly supported by 2021 pregnancies, Hladun told Ukrainian media earlier this year. In 2023, some couples have had children in the hope that the war will end.

But in 2024, as it became clear that peace was not imminent, the birth rate fell sharply. It now stands at 0.9 children per woman, a record level and well below the 2.1 children needed to maintain the population (for comparison, the total fertility rate in the EU is 1.38).

While a drop in births is to be expected in wartime, Hladun says, in peacetime it is usually followed by a compensating increase thanks to those who have delayed the birth of children. But this effect is limited and typically lasts up to five years – too short a period to have a significant effect on Ukraine’s gloomy long-term prospects.

“The longer a war lasts, the more this compensatory effect diminishes,” adds Hladun, because couples who delayed having children during the conflict no longer have the option. “And for us, it’s already been four years, which is quite a long time.”

According to the National Academy of Sciences, the effects of war will last well beyond the end of hostilities – which, in any case, is not in sight. The result, he says, could be a population of 25.2 million by 2051, less than half of what it was in 1992.

Even committed couples suffer from the uncertainty of war.

Olena, 33, went to a fertility clinic in the suburbs of Lviv for an examination. She is a police officer and military instructor who is currently freezing her eggs because health issues make it difficult for her and her husband to conceive.

At some point, Olena says, they will try IVF – but only “taking into account my work and the situation in the country.”

Olena remembers pre-war life as beautiful and “full of hope”. But his dream of starting a family was put on hold with the start of the invasion in 2022.

“For the first year of the war, it was like everything stopped,” she says. “Everything we aspired to do – build a house, plan for children – nothing mattered anymore.”

These fears have not disappeared, even in Lviv which, like other regions of western Ukraine, has been relatively spared from the worst Russian attacks. But for Olena, the question of having children now comes down to a sense of duty. “I am doing this both for myself, for my family and for Ukraine,” she says. According to her, soldiers on the front lines also die for the sake of unborn Ukrainian children.

Across the desk, Olena’s gynecologist and clinic director, Dr. Liubov Mykhailyshyn, listens.

She’s proud to help “strong, kind women” like Olena, she says. But his big concern is how the war is affecting the fertility of young Ukrainians.

She worries about the years of chronic stress and sleepless nights – as well as the added physical and psychological trauma those on the front lines are experiencing. All of this, she says, can lead to fertility problems, which could impact birth rates in years to come.

“We are waiting for it,” Mykhailyshyn says of the coming demographic crisis. Olena nods.

Recently, the Ukrainian government has developed strategies to address the problem, including child care and affordable housing. These policies, however, rely on local authorities rather than centralized funding – meaning projects often don’t get off the ground, according to Hladun.

And as long as future mothers and children remain exposed to the dangers of war, efforts at the state level may not succeed, he concedes.

Ukraine now has 17 million fewer inhabitants than when it gained independence after the fall of the Soviet Union. Only the return of a substantial part of the 6.5 million Ukrainians living abroad could quickly increase the numbers.

Yet even when the fighting stops, it is unclear how many people will return.

People will be more willing to return if Ukraine manages to reclaim most of the territory captured by Russia since 2014, Hladun suggests. But anything short of enough could leave Ukrainians feeling vulnerable, as it would be seen as a temporary ceasefire rather than a complete end to hostilities.

Despite Moscow’s insistence that it does not want to take over all of Ukraine, many Ukrainians are convinced that Russia poses an existential risk to their country – and one that will outlive Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In this context, the decline of Ukraine’s population must be seen as a security threat, Hladun believes. “Russia is simply much bigger demographically,” he says. “And in that sense, he has more resources for war.”

The longer the war drags on, the more uncertainty will weigh on the country’s long-term recovery prospects.

“Planning for a future seems fragile, almost naive,” says Daria. “This uncertainty is painful, but it is part of everyday life.

“I have come to accept that I can be alone, not because I want to, but because war reshapes what seems possible,” she adds.

“Learning to live with this is in itself a form of survival.”

Additional reporting by Liubov Sholudko.