"You must be raising a ballerina": how Liza's road really began

The series "A conversation with a champion's mother", part 1 of 6 — Kateryna Badikova, founder of IDC, in conversation with Anna, mother of Liza Sahalai.

This summer seven-year-old Liza Sahalai brought home three gold medals from the Dance World Cup world final in Dublin. We have already written about the championship itself in "Liza's road". This conversation is with the person who watched the whole journey from the inside: Liza's mother, Anna. Part one is about a beginning that looked nothing like the story of a future champion.

"A blessing in disguise"

Liza's story as a dancer began not in a dance studio but in a doctor's office. When her daughter was six months old, Anna insisted that the doctor take a closer look at her legs: "I saw her every day — and I could see something wasn't right." At the Institute of Orthopaedics it was confirmed: congenital hip dysplasia. For six months — until she was almost one — Liza wore a special brace.

"It was a huge shock for us, it was painful," Anna recalls. "But the doctor said something then that, I suppose, started all of this: 'It's like with gymnasts. At first it hurts and it's unpleasant, but children's muscles stretch, children get used to it.' My husband and I got through it standing our ground."

Then came a scene the family still remembers with a smile. On holiday, strangers came up to the parents several times: "You must be raising a ballerina?" — "We didn't find it funny at the time, we had a problem," says Anna. "And then we looked: the child is just playing about, and her legs go up to her head. And my husband says: listen, maybe we really should take her to dance, to gymnastics?"

The hip problem was diagnosed in time and treated by doctors — it matters not to confuse cause with effect here. But it was that story that pointed the parents in a direction: sport, grace, discipline.

A studio that knows how to say "wait"

Anna first brought Liza to IDC before her daughter turned three — before the full-scale invasion. They went straight to Yuniia Furman. And what they heard was not "of course, bring her along, pay at reception" but an honest "wait".

"Yuniia explained that the child didn't yet have the stamina and attention span needed even for a toddler group," says Anna. "It was only later that I appreciated that moment. A child walked in who could bring the centre income — and we were turned away. That person was guided not by profit but by whether the child was ready. If Liza had been asked to do things back then, she might have said: sorry, I don't like any of this."

Skhidnytsia: eyes that lit up

Then came what came for thousands of Ukrainian families: 24 February, evacuation, the west of the country. In the small town of Skhidnytsia, where the family went, there were no clubs at all at first. Chance helped: outside a café they struck up a conversation with a young woman who turned out to be an acrobatics and gymnastics coach — she was putting a group together and was particularly keen to include displaced children.

"Liza came out of her first class with her eyes shining: 'I'm going to keep coming,'" Anna recalls. "A month or two later, at the open class, there were cartwheels, splits, her first backbends."

Four studios with a "but" — and one with an atmosphere

When the family returned to Irpin, the question of what next came up again. Anna and her husband went round four or five options: studios, after-school clubs, different neighbourhoods. "There was some 'but' everywhere," she says. Then Anna suggested: let's try IDC again.

"It was my husband's first time there. We come out and he says: I don't know how they teach here — but I really, really liked the atmosphere itself. If you think this is good, then yes."

This time Yuniia looked at Liza and said: I'll take her, straight into the PRO group — which was being formed at exactly that moment, in the summer of 2023. The child who had once been honestly told "too early" ended up where she was meant to be — but in her own time.

"So when's the next class?"

Anna describes the first class in the new group briefly: "There was no longer a question of whether I'll keep going. It was a statement: so when's the next class?"

And one more detail that matters for parents who are hesitating right now: the family had no grand plans at all. "We weren't dreaming of achieving anything lofty. It was simply for the child's development, for her enjoyment," says Anna. Three gold medals at a world final did not grow out of ambition — they grew out of a child's enjoyment and the honesty of the adults around her.

Next in the series: how the family manages the "school + dance + gymnastics" schedule — and why there is a lunchbox in the car. Read part 2 →

Quotes lightly edited for readability. Would you like your child to try? Book a trial class — UAH 300.