Still ar­ri­ving or: First ap­proach with the Ag­ger­tal Dam

Sun­day, 13.04.2025

I’m now th­ree weeks back from my At­lan­tic hike, which could have been much lon­ger. Back in Ger­many, Wind­eck, in the sou­thern­most tip of NRW, in the beau­tiful Rhein-Sieg dis­trict. I still can’t re­ally ca­te­go­rise a lot of what I’m ex­pe­ri­en­cing and find mys­elf in a kind of new state and also in a hol­ding pat­tern. Last week, we took our new Cherry to the Ber­gisch re­gion for the first time, just 30 mi­nu­tes away from us, to go hi­king at the Ag­ger­tal­sperre re­ser­voir. We thought a lake would be nice. The pho­tos were stun­ning, just like a real ho­li­day at the lake. The rea­lity is dif­fe­rent. Or am I spoilt? Un­fort­u­na­tely, al­most all the hi­king trails around the lake run di­rectly along­side a road that is much too busy, and on Sa­tur­days the traf­fic is also do­mi­na­ted by heavy mo­tor­bikes. No re­crea­tio­nal fac­tor. No na­ture with all your sen­ses. No fun for me. Only very short paths are car-free. Loud traf­fic noise and ex­haust fu­mes ever­y­where. But let’s go back for a mo­ment to the last two weeks when you did­n’t hear from me.

My ‘new’ self and first so­cial interactions

I tried a few first mee­tings with fri­ends from Wind­eck, even with lar­ger groups. I ar­ran­ged to meet for a meal, to talk, make mu­sic and sing, to ex­ch­ange ideas. Ques­ti­ons come up, so­me­ti­mes im­me­dia­tely, so­me­ti­mes only at the end of a mee­ting. I find it dif­fi­cult to ans­wer the ques­ti­ons about my con­di­tion, even days la­ter my thoughts are still run­ning th­rough my head. They al­ways seem to re­volve around the worry of not re­ally be­ing un­ders­tood, but be­ing seen in the wrong light. But I feel the same way in si­tua­tions where I am not as­ked or say any­thing and have the fee­ling that I am not re­co­g­nised at all in my new self and my in­ner fee­ling of na­ked­ness. I am not ill. I’m just dif­fe­rent. And I usually hide it. Just ac­cep­ting that I am dif­fe­rent, com­bi­ned with prac­ti­sing wi­th­dra­wing from so­cial si­tua­tions from time to time, has worked won­ders and al­lo­wed me to brea­the a sigh of re­lief. I am do­ing very well with be­ing dif­fe­rent. How I deal with it mys­elf and how others deal with it is very im­portant. It’s dif­fi­cult to de­scribe. Every now and then I find mys­elf in a si­tua­tion where I sud­denly feel like a sick per­son who has to ex­plain hers­elf be­cause no­body had any idea about my in­ner self be­fore, which makes me seem un­trust­wor­thy. I un­der­stand that very well. I feel pretty bad du­ring such con­ver­sa­ti­ons, I can’t ex­press mys­elf cle­arly, I can’t pro­tect mys­elf or set boun­da­ries. I want to learn to po­si­tion mys­elf more cle­arly, to not want to dis­cuss these to­pics in pu­blic so­cial si­tua­tions and still not have to be afraid of rejection.

At­tempt at a brief review

Af­ter 3 ye­ars, my part­ner and I want to leave Wind­eck in July 2024. We have ren­ted a sui­ta­ble flat in Co­lo­gne for this pur­pose. An­o­ther move is on the cards. This would be my 23^rd. For the first time, I’m fin­ding it in­cre­di­bly dif­fi­cult to pack bo­xes and or­ga­nise ever­y­thing. The Wind­ecker Länd­chen is so good for my part­ner and me, and I have ta­ken many peo­ple into my he­art. Above all, ho­we­ver, I hope that this ch­ange of lo­ca­tion will (once again) bring me clo­ser to my for­mer en­vi­ron­ment in Co­lo­gne. Con­nec­ting with the mu­sic scene in this so­cia­ble and cul­tu­rally di­verse city on the Rhine. I’ve been working in Co­lo­gne quite suc­cessfully for around 25 ye­ars. There was a bit of a ch­ange on the ho­ri­zon due to a pri­vate de­ve­lo­p­ment in 2019, but due to co­rona, I have been ex­pe­ri­en­cing a ma­jor in­ter­rup­tion in my career since 2020. I ra­rely per­form in pu­blic with con­certs or other mu­sic, art or theatre pro­jects! In­s­tead, I teach in­di­vi­dual ses­si­ons on 4 days, give small voice and sin­ging work­shops and cour­ses. Life in Wind­eck is quiet and beau­tiful, the na­ture and peace are in­cre­di­bly he­althy. Ho­we­ver, even 4 ye­ars af­ter Co­rona, I’m still strugg­ling here as a sin­ger, mu­si­cian and voice teacher.

The con­cept of com­mu­ting to Co­lo­gne one to th­ree times a week and gra­du­ally buil­ding up more and more in Wind­eck is pro­ving to be ex­tre­mely ex­haus­ting and drai­ning. The Deut­sche Bahn is a ma­jor pro­blem: sche­du­ling 2 hours in ad­di­tion to the 3‑hour jour­ney to and from Co­lo­gne is of­ten not en­ough. Jour­neys to and from Co­lo­gne be­come se­rious day trips, where I’m on the road for 12 – 16 hours in­s­tead of 8. I leave the house at 7am and ar­rive home around 11.30pm. For me and my hy­per­sen­si­ti­vity, this is a cree­ping, in­cre­asing bur­den over time. These con­di­ti­ons turn tea­ching days in Co­lo­gne into a night­mare. So mo­ving back to Co­lo­gne seems to be THE solution.

For­t­u­na­tely, the whole move did­n’t work out for va­rious re­asons that are not re­le­vant here. Thanks to our he­a­ven-sent land­lady, my part­ner and I can sim­ply stay in Wind­eck in our beau­tiful do­mic­ile! In July and Au­gust last year, I had to quickly re­verse the en­tire move, in­clu­ding my pro­fes­sio­nal ac­ti­vi­ties (Wind­eck-Co­lo­gne-Co­lo­gne-Wind­eck) and re­or­ga­nise again. And that’s caus­ing me a lot of stress. At the same time, I’m trai­ning to be­come a yoga te­a­cher, which is very ex­haus­ting. As a re­sult, I had my se­cond sud­den hea­ring loss at the end of Au­gust, which I have al­re­ady men­tio­ned here in this blog, as well as all the other pro­blems that fol­lo­wed, which have been men­tio­ned a few times in my last blog posts. Since that time, since July 2024, I have not re­ally been back to my centre for these reasons.

Bet­ween set­ting off and arriving 

And so to­day I am back in Wind­eck. Af­ter a lot of tur­bu­lence on the out­side, a he­alth cri­sis on the in­side, the sub­se­quent time out with re­pea­ted doubts and ques­ti­ons about the mea­ning and exis­tence of life. Af­ter a hike on the At­lan­tic and the un­ex­pec­tedly early rea­li­sa­tion that I wan­ted to give my neu­ro­di­ver­sity a sta­ble frame­work. For th­ree weeks now, I have been slowly and carefully loo­king around the large house and gar­den in Ober­nau. Since July 2024, the house and gar­den have also been in a kind of state of shock, just like me. Since we did­n’t move last sum­mer, I’ve only done the bare mi­ni­mum here be­cause there was no other op­tion. My part­ner, on the other hand, is ex­tre­mely busy at work and is happy and com­ple­tely ful­fil­led, which is won­derful. We had al­re­ady said good­bye to Wind­eck in de­tail, to many dear peo­ple and groups, fo­rests and places, flowers, trees, gras­ses, rooms, spaces and walls. For th­ree weeks now, I have been de­vo­ting mys­elf to pluck­ing lea­ves, sort­ing rooms, bo­xes and cup­boards, wa­shing, dus­ting, clea­ning win­dows and cut­ting dry wood in peace every day for the first time. I feel as if the house and gar­den are wa­king up af­ter a long sleep. I have a lot to do and I pro­ceed con­sciously and very, very slowly.

Yes­ter­day we re­pea­ted a hike that we loved very much in our first year in Wind­eck and still love very much: The Wald­my­then­weg in the Ber­gi­sches Land near Wald­bröl. If you’re ever in the neigh­bour­hood, walk it. It’s re­ally beau­tiful, a bit hilly (it makes you sweat a bit), with very wide views. We have time to talk while we walk. What is my cur­rent si­tua­tion? Al­ter­na­ting with these in­cre­asingly cal­ming and groun­ding ac­ti­vi­ties out­side, I fol­low new ideas and ad­dres­ses on the in­ter­net every day for the pur­pose of a psy­chic dia­gno­sis. So far wi­t­hout any suc­cess to speak of, ra­ther fail­ure. Com­plete can­cel­la­ti­ons due to lack of ca­pa­city, wai­ting times of 9 – 12 months, at the Bonn and Co­lo­gne Uni­ver­sity Cli­nic of 1.5 ye­ars. No wai­ting lists. Strong wa­ves of emo­tion fol­low the re­pea­ted com­ple­tion of re­gis­tra­tion forms and small to ex­ten­sive tests on the cur­rent con­di­tion. Chan­ging sta­tes, ran­ging from as­to­nish­ment, joy, cla­rity and new be­gin­nings to sad­ness about the past de­ca­des and fear of the fu­ture. An al­ter­na­tion of ac­tion­ism, te­ar­ful­ness and pa­ra­ly­sis, from po­si­ti­vism to ne­ga­ti­vism and vice versa. Not to for­get: Im­pa­ti­ence and quick-tem­pe­red an­ger about ever­y­thing that is bad and un­just in this world, ever­y­thing that does­n’t work im­me­dia­tely, ever­y­thing that is ‘wrong’…

What hap­pens next here

De­spite or even be­cause of this, I can laugh of­ten and a lot, have a good time, hike, me­di­tate, read, watch films, make mu­sic, write, paint and eat well. Be­cause I live here with my part­ner and our cat in a very safe and se­cure en­vi­ron­ment. I feel bet­ter, good again, still good. I am prac­ti­sing re­co­g­nis­ing and ac­cep­ting my other­ness, my sen­si­ti­vi­ties, re­co­g­nis­ing my cur­rent state, so­cial wi­th­dra­wal, cal­ming down when ap­pro­priate, wi­t­hout gui­dance or com­pany, with small suc­ces­ses. Start­ing to think about re­sum­ing my pro­fes­sio­nal ac­ti­vi­ties and loo­king for­ward to meaningful work. Ever­y­thing I have learnt in the past in my self-care, in­ner sta­bi­lity and sup­port trai­ning makes so much sense in the con­text of self-awa­re­ness and self-ac­cep­tance of my other­ness and helps me so much in my ever­y­day life. This would not be pos­si­ble wi­t­hout the di­gi­tal world. Vi­deos, coun­sel­ling, on­line tests, au­dio books with hyp­no­sis and me­di­ta­tion exer­ci­ses. I search and find. Hur­ray for mo­dern tech­no­logy. I thank.

This blog will now take a break for a while, be­cause I’m not hi­king in the di­stance at the mo­ment, but, as you’ve seen, near Wind­eck. Not ²⁴⁄₇ eit­her, but only one or two days a week. Wri­ting down my ex­pe­ri­en­ces on my jour­ney and long-di­stance hike, first and fo­re­most for mys­elf and then also for you, gave me great plea­sure and is a flowing, easy thing to do. I will be happy to do this again im­me­dia­tely when I go tra­vel­ling again in the fu­ture. Then you will cer­tainly be the first to hear about it and can read along and tra­vel with me.

Un­til the next trip, I would the­r­e­fore like to take this op­por­tu­nity to thank you from the bot­tom of my he­art for your at­ten­tion, your sym­pa­thy and your feed­back and say good­bye here in this blog.

I sin­ce­rely wish you a won­derful start to the week, a won­derful time and a won­derful life!

Stay sta­ble and give yours­elf a big hug!

See you soon,