By Roselle Chen

(Reuters] – Antonina Skobina was the U.S.’s ballroom dancing champion when she last spoke to her mother Mariupol in Ukraine. The family didn’t have electricity nor heating.

This was March 2. Skobina never heard anything from them again.

She said, “It feels physical pain, as if somebody is just stabbing you with a knife,” in Brooklyn, New York on Wednesday.

Every cell of my body hurts. It is hard to know the fate of my family and my mother. … It’s unbearable.”

Three-time U.S. professional ballroom dancing champion, she said that she used to talk to her mom every day. Communication became increasingly difficult following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24th. Mariupol, a strategically important port city in the conflict was a focal point of the fighting.

Skobina said that Skobina was unable to leave her grandparents and mother because of the paralysis caused by diabetes.

Skobina stated that her mom had said in the last conversation that electricity, heating, and water have been shut off.

Skobina refused to reveal the names of Skobina’s mother or grandparents due to security concerns.

According to her, they said my grandfather had died due to lack of medication around mid-March according the information I got from a neighbour who evacuated Mariupol.

“I wish my grandmother and mother were still alive. My greatest wish is to be able to hear them again.

Bucha’s mass graves near Kyiv, and Mariupol’s destruction have become symbols of what the Kremlin calls its “special military operations” in Ukraine.