Rustam was one of the children, who were discarded immediately after he was born, and left at the hospital because of his appearance.
The adorable toddler was born with “several malformations,” that modified his face and left him with one leg and a partial hip. He was fed through a tube for the first two years of his life, and over the next two years, doctors “literally piece-by-piece by collected his face.”
@nika_evil_ Таким мы увидели Рустама когда приехали знакомиться с ним в Детский дом – 3 года назад.#приемныйребенок #приемнаясемья #семьясмыслжизни
But no one wanted to adopt or foster Rustam, born in Russia, who still needed several procedures to live a healthy life.
Then, in 2017, the kind-hearted Nika Zlobin, who wanted to foster or adopt a child, came across the photo of four-year-old Rustam.
“There was a hole instead of a face,” the Moscow woman recalls of seeing his picture.
After expressing interest in the youngster, she and her husband Yuri received a list of what Rustam needed: speech therapy, plastic surgery, and a prosthetic leg.
The woman said (translated into English): “I read it, I figured – well, everything is solvable. Why don’t we do that too?”
Their first meeting with the child went better than expected. “When Yuri and I arrived, they brought Rustam to us in the playroom.” Nika continues, “You know, I was ready for a lot, I thought he was in diapers, but when I met him he seemed like a child prodigy. I was shocked, honestly.”
Nika and Yuri’s timing was perfect as Rustam, who spoke with gestures, was preparing to be transferred to a “house of the disabled.”
“And he wouldn’t have survived in a disabled home,” Nika said, adding that the trip would have been a one-way ticket.
The couple quickly filled in the documents placed Rustam in the car, and drove him to his new home in Moscow.
“I know that many adoptive parents worry about whether they can love someone else’s child as their own. I didn’t think about it,” Nika said, adding she is equally stern with him as she is with her biological daughter, Iya.
The parents also do not treat him any differently and expect the boy to work with them on his therapies.
@nika_evil_ Спустя 3 года #протезноги #особенныйребёнок #детитанцуют
Although Rustam protested, she taught him to walk and encouraged her son to move around the apartment on his crutches.
“Rus protested, cried, asked to be carried… showed [his] character. But then he got down to business and very quickly walked at speed,” she said.
Since Rustam joined the family, Nika has been raising awareness, and championing the rights and dignities of disabled people.
However, people still take the opportunity to attack the boy, with some calling him a monster.
“One woman wrote to me: ‘Let’s call things by their words, freak…’” Nika recalls one message. “Or they often write: ‘How did you decide to do this, we would not be able to live next to such a freak.’”
Nika lovingly responds to these comments: “I don’t know, maybe someone always wants to look at the beautiful. What is more important to me is that Rustam has the whole world inside.”
Although she has learned to be thick-skinned, Nika admits the attacks can be hurtful. “[People] like to put labels… If you don’t look like everyone else. A lot of evil, a lot.”
Despite the cruel comments, Rustam’s parents support their son and make sure he knows “that everything was fine with him: two eyes, a nose, a mouth. Soon there will be two legs. He sees, hears, speaks.”
The boy, now around 10 years old, is relying on his “brightness and courage,” styling his hair – perky ponytails and dreadlocks – and wearing bold clothing to express his colorful personality.
@nika_evil_
“Rus thinks very broadly and open-mindedly and sometimes makes paradoxical conclusions. “That’s why it was easy for me to persuade him to experiment boldly,” Nika says of her son. “Rustam doesn’t ask any questions about his appearance at all. He repeats with pleasure that his whole family is beautiful, and he is so handsome in general.”
Unfortunately, Nika’s Instagram has since been deleted, so we can no longer follow Rustam’s wild dance moves and awesome hair.
She previously said, “If my account should suddenly be blocked then I’ll probably feel better because I won’t see dozens of haters commenting about my son.”
It’s so sad that people have to say such cruel things to a beautiful couple who gave the world to a helpless little boy.
