Natalie Tina Zacharkiw Riccio

Natalie Tina Zacharkiw Riccio was born on February 5th, 1943, in New York City and died June 30th, 2025, in Upstate New York. Wife of Dominick John Riccio, mother of Alexandra and Mark Riccio.

Her parents Daniel Zacharkiw and Olga Opiella left their village Pid'yarkiv (Під'ярків) in western Ukraine in the 1920s and started their family on the Lower Eastside of Manhattan.  She was the second child with an older sister Anna and younger sister Irene. Natalie attended Saint George Ukrainian Catholic School for elementary and graduated Cathedral High School for girls in NYC.

Natalie entered Saint John’s College in Queens as English major and later finished her DSW at Fordham University where she was hired in the graduate department as an instructor of social work. She met Dominick Riccio at Saint Vicent’s Hospital while they were working in the mental ward to pay their colleges expenses. After they married, they moved to the Upper West Side and worked mainly in the field of Psychoanalysis and Social Work. Natalie believed in a rich education for her children and was active at the Rudolf Steiner School chairing the school fairs and other PTA activities.

Natalie immersed herself in psychoanalytic theory at various institutes finishing her post-doctoral studies at Modern Analytic. As her children grew older, Natalie spent her time at various psychoanalytic schools teaching and volunteering while also teaching at Fordham University.  Yonata Feldman was her psychoanalytic mentor and therapist for many years and a great light in her life. Natalie suffered greatly from depression and rage and Dr. Feldman helped her to stay on track and be productive in the world.

Natalie was active at the UN and accompanied Carol Lubin for a decade through its hallowed halls. She felt the UN was a place where she could play a tiny part in the happenings of the world. Never a politician, she quietly retreated to teaching at Fordham, Yeshiva, and various psychoanalytic institutes.

Natalie read constantly. When I spoke to her in 2011, she had just finished a 500-page book on Turkish history, Kandel’s book on the mind, and two books on Dutch history of New York. Natalie had an eye for important ideas. She would become silent and read situations and people with great insight.  It was Natalie’s interests that gave my father some cultural direction in his life and in this way she influenced him greatly.

In the last ten years of her life, she was intending on writing a book on the important of developmental diagnosis.  She would teach such theories in her classes, but never found the time and energy to bring them in a coherent whole. A task she can finish in a next life.

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