Peta Murgatroyd is getting emotional with her fans amid Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
On Wednesday night, the New Zealand-born Australian dancer, 35, shared a video on her Instagram Stories expressing how heartbroken she and husband Maks Chmerkovskiy, who is Ukrainian, have been as the news continue to unfold.
“Hey guys I’ve had a morning,” she began the video before referencing a previously shared video highlighting the number of children and families killed by bomb explosions in Ukraine.
“This is continually breaking my heart,” she continued. “Like, I’m struggling to get through some days. Some days I have great days, other days I have terrible days because I just can’t get it out of my head. I’ve walked those streets, I’ve been there. It is such a beautiful country and the children that are dying now…”
Murgatroyd added that Chmerkovskiy, who was in Ukraine at the beginning of the attacks and had been documenting the atrocities in real time, is back at home and has been figuring out more ways to help the situation.
“Believe me, just because my husband is home it does not mean — he’s home for now — it does not mean that we aren’t continually doing stuff to try to help,” she said. “And [that] we aren’t continually thinking about what is going on every single day, please be aware of that.”
It’s certainly been an emotional roller coaster for the Murgatroyd-Chmerkovskiy family in recent weeks.
In early March, Murgatroyd shared a touching post celebrating the return of Chmerkovskiy at the Los Angeles airport, acknowledging that she “never thought our family would be directly affected by this in our lifetime.”
“I never thought what we are seeing on our TV’s was a reality in 2022,” she said at the time. “I have never hugged him so tight. Shaking and forever grateful. Now it’s time to heal. We cannot go back to our normal. Our lives are forever changed. We have a new normal, and that’s ok.”
“Although @maksimc made it home, this DOES NOT mean we aren’t continuing our efforts to provide assistance to the Ukrainian refugees,” she added. “We have big plans in store and our sole focus is on this war. A smaller plan is going up on my stories soon!”
Though Chmerkovskiy is currently in Los Angeles, as noted by Murgatroyd, the Dancing With the Stars pro previously touched on the idea of possibly returning to Europe at some point.
“I’m currently working on an opportunity to go back, and so probably some time next week I’m going to go back to Poland and join the efforts on the ground,” he told CNN’s Anderson Cooper earlier this month. “And so [I] sort of want to justify my safe out that way.”
The dancer also opened up about feeling “guilty” for fleeing the country — according to the United Nations, more than 3 million Ukrainians have fled the country to date.
“I’m still very much in that fight or flight,” he told Good Morning America earlier this month. “I’m a big boy. I know for a fact that I’m going through something mentally. … I get into these cry moments. I’m emotional. I can’t control it. I cried on the way from the airport. I felt embarrassed.”
When asked if he felt guilt over being able to leave, he replied, “Yeah. I feel guilty. I feel bad. I feel ashamed. I feel upset.”
