About

Nellie Barg grew up in post-World War II Ukraine and became a speech pathologist. In 1989, she and her daughter fled Kiev. For ten years of her life, Nellie lived in an abusive relationship with a husband, who, while torturing her, refused to let her go. “I became involved with the opposition movement, became a dissident and, in 1979, a “Refusenik.”  It was not until 1989 that I was able to leave with my teenage daughter; refugees to the United States, escaping the KGB and persecution.”

Nellie went on to work for twenty years as a speech therapist for NYC Public Schools.

Her published essays include: “On Freedom in America: Three Decades of New Year” in Matador Magazine (December 2014), “Surviving Chernobyl” in The Missing Slate (June 2015), and “Ruins and Shelters” in The Missing Slate (March 2016).

Nellie’s forthcoming memoir is titled My Different Lives: Through the Iron Curtain to Freedom.