UT Martin student Drake Box, left, has a painting, center, of the Ghost of Kyiv from his Ukrainian friend Vlad. At right is a photo of the front gate of the Ukrainian orphanage from which Box was adopted as a toddler. | Photos courtesy Drake Box
“She didn’t have any money. She was 18. A young mom didn’t want to tell her dad that she had a kid, so she went and had me in Ukraine in a hospital where they delivered me for free,” says Drake Box, a UT Martin senior Mass Media and Strategic Communication major from Dyersburg, Tennessee.
His mother, a young Russian woman, crossed the border into Ukraine to have her child. She could not afford his birth certificate, so she placed him for adoption. Roughly two years later, an American couple named Gary and Lory Box set out on a journey to meet and adopt the little boy.
The story of their journey is dramatic because of Ukraine’s governmental corruption at the time. Gary Box, Box’s adoptive father, had to carry money on the inside of his shirt through security checkpoints to prevent being robbed. Lory Box, his adoptive mother, had to wear certain headdresses to obey Ukrainian culture.
The most dramatic portion of their journey to adopt a child happened at the doors of the orphanages in Ukraine.
“[I]n the orphanages, my parents had to pay [the workers] … pay them in order to see kids,” Box says. “They only let [my adoptive parents] see me and this other little boy because they didn’t want to pay a lot of money. So, they let [my parents] see the sick kids. They didn’t let them see the healthy kids.
“We were really malnourished. They thought we were going to die within two weeks,” he says.
Ukraine was a young country in 2002. Less than 10 years before, the country gained its independence from the USSR. Because of its newly independent status, the Ukrainian government had not yet set regulations for the operation of orphanages.
Box’s adoptive parents had no choice if they wanted to visit children, so they paid. As they returned to America, they carried a malnourished toddler in their arms.
As a child, Box knew that he was adopted, and he believes it was beneficial for him. Knowing of his adoption and international heritage has helped Box to develop his identity.
“My parents made me very aware, not like in an outcast type of way,” he says. “[T]hey told me when I was young so, that way, I could embrace it. That’s how I decided to look at it.”
In addition to his adoption from Ukraine, Box has another quality that has helped him shape his identity.
At 2 years old, Box was officially diagnosed with mild spastic cerebral palsy, a lifelong disability for which there is no cure. He says that living with cerebral palsy mostly affects his legs now.
“My Achilles tendons are always tight; it’s never relaxed because I don’t have enough spasticity, stretchability, flexibility within that muscle,” he says. “If I put my foot down, heel to toe, walk like a normal step, it hurts. It’s like sharp pain. And I have muscle spasms and arthritis.”
Box also describes how cerebral palsy affected him as a child. A basic task such as holding a fork took him longer to learn than most children. To develop his fine motor skills, the doctors encouraged one activity in particular.
“When I was younger, I played a lot of video games because they wanted me to develop my fine motor skills, like being able to move my thumbs and all that,” Box says. “General stuff that people don’t even think about doing, it’s like it was all affected by my CP.”
“It’s kind of like a blessing and a curse. It’s offered a lot of opportunity, too, that you wouldn’t think about,” he says.
As a young adult, advocacy has allowed Box to further appreciate his differences. He hosts a podcast called “The Box Factor,” on which he advocates for both people with disabilities and for the Ukrainian cause. In June 2022, Box was also elected to serve on the board of directors for Tennessee Disability Coalition.
“I feel like I have a duty to speak up for those people who can’t speak for themselves. That’s why I’m so vocal about what I go through, so that people know,” he says.
As a board member for Tennessee Disability Coalition, Box continues to tell his story of living with cerebral palsy and hear the stories of others.
His podcast is more personal and therapeutic. The episode topics range from the invasion of Ukraine to living with cerebral palsy and adoption.
“The podcast is based off perspective. Everything I talk about, I’ve either been through or seen,” he says. “I don’t make any money from it, but for me, it’s my ability to tell my story, so I take full advantage of it.”
With a small audience of 50 to 60 listeners, on average, Box says he often receives emails from listeners who relate to the podcast. That, in his opinion, is the sign of success – to know that his work makes others feel less alone.
His podcast not only helps him share the details of his personal journey, but also serves as a way for Box to create more awareness for the war in Ukraine. As a young man with no memories of Ukraine, Box passionately promotes victory over Russia.
“When it first happened, like, I remember the night it first happened. ‘Russia has begun its full-scale invasion of Ukraine,’” he says, reciting the news headline from memory. “I’m like, ‘Oh, s**t.’ And that’s me not having any prior or active connection to Ukraine.
“Just today, I had somebody say, ‘Oh, that’s a really small country,” he says, with a passionate glint in his eyes. “No. Ukraine is – before the war, 44 million people lived there.”
Seeing the first news headlines that detailed the beginning of the invasion and the following war hurt Box. As a young man with no active connection to Ukraine, Box still felt highly offended by Russian’s attacks on innocent Ukrainians.
“Just because it happened in Europe or ‘over there,’ and just because we don’t see the missiles flying over or see people getting shot in the street just because they’re out of their house – you know what I’m saying,” he says. “This is real life, and people need to understand how blessed we are to live where we live.”
He says he felt as if Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, was personally taking away his chance to visit Ukraine and better connect with his roots. Box planned to take the trip with his adoptive mother before she died in 2010 after a two-year-long battle with leukemia.
“I always told my mom before she passed, ‘I want to go back. I want to see where I’m from. We’re going to go back,’” he says. “Then, when that happened, I felt like Russia or Putin, more likely, was trying to take that away from me.
“It just tears me apart. That’s why I’ve organized events on UTM’s campus and done fundraisers and podcasts,” he says.
Box’s efforts to create awareness and raise funds for Ukraine have been helped by a new friend named Vlad, who lives in Kyiv, Ukraine. The two men connected after Box’s girlfriend saw Vlad’s daily Facebook updates about living in war-torn Ukraine and shared them with Box. Box then reached out to Vlad via Facebook Messenger and struck up a conversation.
As a guest on “The Box Factor,” Vlad described the heightened adrenaline that comes with living in Kyiv. The two men kept in touch after the podcast, and Box recently received a package from Vlad.
“He actually sent me two paintings that were hand-painted by a Ukrainian artist about the fighter pilot, the Ghost of Kyiv,” Box says.
The Ghost of Kyiv, now a celebrated Ukrainian war hero, is credited with shooting down several Russian aircraft in one day. Box kept one of the paintings and hung it above his desk. With the second painting, he set up an auction and raised funds to donate directly to the Ukrainian cause.
For Americans who want to help, Box encourages donations be made to United 24. That group, which is the collection platform created by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, ensures that 100% of all charitable donations benefit the Ukrainian cause.
As time marches on, Box continues to learn about his past. He is far from shy about sharing his story, which is therapeutic for him and beneficial for the causes he supports.
“It’s really insane when you really think about it – how many, like, normal families there are made every day, I guess you could say,” Box says with a laugh. “Then, you have people like me who just have a past that I’m still learning about to this day.”
