How my love for roofs began. First impressions! (Patreon)

As a child, I was wildly afraid of heights, I not only couldn’t go to the edge but in general even look down. I felt dizzy and lost my balance. I have this fear from my mother, she is also very afraid of heights. And as a child, I would never have thought that heights would be for me something more than a hobby. Today, for me to climb the heights is absolutely no difficulty, and I want to tell you just about that. How it all started.

We’re back to the distant 2014. I was 15 years old and I was a very private person. I couldn`t talk to people because I was afraid. I had no friends, so I walked a lot alone. It was difficult for me to open myself to people because I didn’t even have a person with whom I could talk and tell about my problems. I’m used to not tell parents anything since they didn`t show interest in my life. And now I understand them. I do nothing dangerous and it’s not worth worrying about me. Every new day meant nothing to me. I went to school (and sometimes didn’t go at all), without understanding for what reason this is all and what will happen after I finish my studies.

On the 5th of September, another simple day passes. I wake up, have breakfast and go to study. I come to college and go to classes. My classmate comes up and says: “Do you want to go to the bridge with us today?” This idea seemed interesting to me. I agreed and waited for the class to finish. After the couple, we went to one famous Kyiv bridge. This is an arched bridge that crosses the river Dnipro. By design, it resembles a half oval. This bridge, as it seems to me, is known throughout not only Kyiv. He is known for such facts: the most expensive, long-built, tall, abandoned (at that time), and easily accessible. Seriously, there were so many people that the police were sick of catching, and just stopped react on calling. He was about 100 meters in height. Since this bridge resembles an oval, you could climb onto it just running. But the builders poured this place with special slippery liquid so that people wouldn`t climb there. But it was still not so problematic, because the climbing people hung the rope there so that you could hold on and walk along the bridge without fear of slipping. But this is only to the first tier. Next, you need to get inside of the bridge and reach its middle. After you need to climb out through a small hole there and enjoy the view.

For me, it was such an event to get in there. When I approached it, everything inside me froze. Besides the heart, it pounded like mad. I stood below and really didn`t want to go there, my fear seized me. My body began to shake and gradually numb. But I pulled myself together, grabbed the rope and began to take the first steps. When you are afraid of heights, the most different ways of an accident are drawn in your head. Now I’m already halfway, I can hardly move around and a friend screams at me in support, so that I don’t worry. So I got to the first tier, the height was about 30-35 meters. For me, this was already a huge feat. After I needed to climb inside the bridge and not worry about the height since it wasn`t visible. To get inside the bridge I needed to climb through a small gap. Such moments, I call the "Fat Test", when you check your body for overweight. Thus, not everyone can climb into this place. For me, this didn`t cause any difficulty, since I am not very big. Inside the bridge, it was much easier for me, although it was difficult to go up the stairs, but my soul was calm. When I reached the middle of the bridge and saw the space through which I had to climb out, I began to panic very much. First, it was necessary to climb to the upper corner of the bridge structure, climb out into this hole directly above the abyss and move like a caterpillar to climb up. For me, it was a panicky impossible task. For a long time, I gathered my thoughts. My friends had already climbed in and I alone remained inside the bridge and thought whether I needed it. I was tormented by thoughts. On the one hand, I almost did it, because I’m already upstairs and I just have to climb onto the external structure. On the other hand, it is very dangerous, suddenly something could happen. It was for 10-15 minutes. It was a struggle between “Yes, I’m still a coward and I won’t do it” and “I have to do it since I'm already here.” As I have gathered my thoughts, I decided to try to climb. I shouted to my friends that I would climb and that they would help me if necessary because I was not sure that I could do it myself. And so, I grabbed onto the structure, rose higher, grabbed onto this hole and pulled myself even higher. The heart rate was, it seems to me, the maximum. I stuck my head out and saw friends, one of them told me: “Give me your hand, I will pull you up, and you can easily get here”. I gave a hand, and a friend pulled me toward him. It turned out even easier than I thought. There was no danger there. The weather was very pleasant. There was a light breeze, which was very on time since I was sweaty because of everything I had experienced. I still could not come to the edge, and I did not need to. I could already enjoy the view. I just sat almost in the center of the bridge structure and did not move. I had a shock. After sitting there for 20 minutes, I decided to try to look down. I could not come to the edge, I crawled. It was still impossible for me. Friends told me that there is another interesting place for photography. For me, this day was very significant, and I wanted to remember this for life. My friends helped me to get back into this hole, it was even easier than to get in. We went a little further than the middle of the bridge and came across a connection of structures. There was a small site. There was a bulging structure on this site, where you could get up and take a picture. Since it was above the abyss, it was very difficult for me to get there. But I did it, as I took photos from there. After this site, I wanted to get down from the bridge and told friends. They agreed, and we began to come back. Going down, I thought about the view that opened to me from the top of the bridges. This was spectacular. Below, I climbed through that gap and began to slide my sneakers down holding the rope. I really liked everything. I was very happy and wanted to see the city again from above and set out to do it again but in other places. And so my hobby began.

I do this not because I don’t have enough adrenaline, or I want to attract attention in this way, but because I really like the view from above and every time I can challenge myself.