Krutikov was born in Dnipro, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Ukraine (then Yekaterinoslav, Russian Empire), on 27 March 1912. She was the only child born to parents Vladimir Polijevktovič Kruglov and Ana Trofimovna Jakovljeva.

At the age of 7, she left Ukraine with her parents and moved to Turkey, where she resided in Istanbul. She went to school for two years on the island of Kınalıada near Istanbul. Eventually, she moved to Yugoslavia, where she met her future husband.

In 1939, she married Nikolaj Nikolajević Krutikov in Belgrade (present-day Serbia). The couple had three daughters: Natalija (born 1941), Irina (born 1946) and Zinaida (born 1950). They lived in many places in Yugoslavia. She worked as a professor of music and French. She spoke Russian, French, Greek, Turkish, Macedonian, English and Serbian.

Her husband died in 1981. Until the age of 94, she lived alone, and later her daughter Zinaida returned from Russia to take care of her.

Krutikov died in New Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia, on 6 July 2022, at the age of 110 years, 101 days.