What is day of the „broom“? It is the day I understood a little more about life, mistakes and most of all “the game of guilt”. When I was 9 years old I was sexually abused by a member of my family. Since then and although it should have been the other way round I felt guilty and ashamed of who I was. My mother made a taboo out of the matter so that again I believed that somehow it had to be “my fault” for I loved my family and naturally my family loved me back. Later as an adult I often found myself in situations (private and jobwise) where people pointed at me when I had made a mistake or even didn’t make a mistake but they were just in a bad mood and lavished their aggression on me. Because part of me was still believing that again “I couldn’t be right” I didn’t stand up for myself. As a consequence I was the ideal victim or “easy prey” for all those who didn’t address their inner anger in the exact situations but used this “game of guilt” to make somebody else take “their inner trash” away. This was so until the day of the broom. It was an ordinary day, I got up early took the dog for a walk and prepared for work. Right before leaving I opened the door of my flat and found a broom, my dustpan full of dirt together with my handbrush and a letter from my neighbour above. First, my heart sank: It was Friday I had a full workday ahead of me and I needed all my strengths to get through the day teaching my pupils-who were also exhausted from a week full of exams. I knew that if I read my neighbour’s letter now, it would “occupy” my thoughts and make me more stressed out. So against my inner feeling to “solve everything on the spot”, I left for school without reading the letter. Everything went fine until after lunchbreak: I was standing in front of my students when my mobile phone rang. I was afraid that something was wrong with my parents. I picked up the call and it was the dogwalker, who took my assistance dog Kalle for a walk when I had long working days. Kalle had run away after a fight with another dog and he had crossed the street several times. He finally got scared and ran back to the dog walker so that he was safe and on the leash again. The dogwalker however, wasn’t willing to go on taking Kalle for a walk with the other dogs. I felt my energy draining and told him, that I would call him back right after school. When I finally came back home, I still found the broom etc. in front of my door. Kalle greeted me joyfully and at the moment I knew that I could neither persuade the dogwalker to take  Kalle back on  nor solve the  “neighbour  problem” because I was so irritated after a long workday. It was a beautiful day and it was the first time I decided not to “take on” instantly on the things other people “threw” at me and to write a justifying  “letter back”, but to “hold on” and get a break before acting. So I took Kalle and put his leash on the hook on my bike and we rode to the nearby lakes. It took us an hour to get there and on the way back Kalle stayed in his red dog trailer for a rest and I drove us back safely. My anger was gone and so I read my neighbour’s letter. It said that she was disgusted of the way the stairs looked and that even after the cleaning woman had cleaned everything it was soon dirty again. Sighing I cleaned the stairs in our appartment facility of the dirt that I, my dog and the 4 other dogs and the dogwalker had left there. I knew I needed this evening to rest so I wrote the dogwalker I needed to “sleep over things” and found out that he was also relieved to think things over. Before I fell asleep next to my exhausted “runaway dog” I wondered why my neighbour didn’t talk to me this morning instead of putting “up a stage” in front of my doorstep. Why, I wondered, did she “pick” me for this and none of the other dog owners in the house? Somewhere in my subconscious there was a painful insight that these situations kept repeating themselves because deep inside me and before anyone else could accuse me of having done something wrong it was me who did just that. It was a Monday when I finally met my neighbour and asked her, why she hadn’t come to see me that morning. I tried to explain to her that there were 5 dogs in the house, that I often cleaned up behind Kalle but that the dogwalker would come to pick the dogs up when I was at school and leave behind him a trail of dirt from his way through the recreation area. She tried to interrupt me several times always repeating what she had written in her letter. I told her that I would talk to the other dog owners and maybe we could “share the additional cleaning”. When she finally left for work and the front door began closing behind her she shouted in my direction: “-I want my broom back!!!”. At that moment I understood that yes-there was a problem about cleanliness but that also my neighbour had a problem by not talking to me or the others involved. When I looked at the broom that was still standing next to my door, I suddenly realised that it was not me who had put it there and that it was none of my responsibility to “bring it back”. So I left it standing next to my door and my neighbour hasn’t yet come to “pick it up”. That day-the day of the broom- I understood that even though there was “a grain of truth” in the critique I was still alright the way I was. Also, I made a vow: Never again in my life would I let myself be used as the “trashcan” for other people’s aggressions. I talked to my other neighbour who had three dogs and we agreed to share the cleaning of the stairs among ourselves. I also told the dogwalker who had decided to take Kalle back under the condition that he remained on a long towing-line during his walks. He promised to clean up after himself. When I see my “broom- neighbour” again, I greet her politely because it is not she who “is the problem”. The problem was that I had not been nice to myself in the past and that the harsh critique of others had often added to my “self-made misery”. The broom however, is still standing next to my door like a proud “monument” of the inner change I have undergone. This is a story I wanted to share with you, dear reader.

When I was 16 I wanted to fly to El Hierro, to visit my father there over Christmas. As El Hierro is the smallest of the Canary Islands, I had to fly to Tenerife and take a small plane from there to El Hierro. I was tired and when I got on a local bus that would get me from the Southern to the Northern airport I hoped that this journey would soon be over so that I could get a rest. The weather turned from sunny to cloudy and a storm was coming up. When I entered the Northern Airport to catch my “small” flight, I still had to wait for 3 hours until it would be announced over the loudspeakers and monitors. I tried to take a nap but the constant announcements in English, Spanish and French kept me awake. When finally “my flight” appeared on the screen it said that it was “delayed”. I was annoyed but still had my hopes high that soon, I could get some sleep in the apartment that my father had rented in El Hierro. Another two hours later I read that the flight was “cancelled”. Although a true storm was raging outside the airport and the people waiting for my flight were nearly the only ones left in the building I could not understand that the plane simply wouldn’t come to “pick me up”. I was cold, exhausted and had no idea what to do next. The airport began to close down and I learned that we were not allowed to sleep there. In my head I was –against all odds-still hoping that I could get to “my father’s island” by ferry. I talked to some tourists but they assured me that they had just come from the harbour and that the ferry wasn’t leaving because of the storm. We got together in a taxi and found a hotel nearby. The next morning, when we arrived at the airport our flight to El Hierro was delayed again. As if it could “speed” things up, my thoughts were circling around the plane that I “wanted to draw by”. I was fighting an inner “war” because I wanted to get out of this frustrating situation. When we saw our plane landing, I was full of joy. This however, didn’t take long. We got on the plane and it took finally off. However, the strong winds were still going on pushing our plane from “behind”. The plane lingered and I was caught by fear. I was totally tense and this time I understood that we could actually die trying to “fight the storm”. Next to me sat some Spanish teenagers from the local football team. They saw my anxiety and said encouragingly: “ꜟTranquila! El avion sale” (=“Calm down! The plane will arrive safely.”)

I was surprised how cheerful everybody around me still was. While I seemed to “fight” against the circumstances, they gradually accepted them- going along with “the flow of life”.  The flight however, became a trip out of “ups” and “downs” because the plane “fell” a few meters down every now and then. When we finally arrived on the small airport of El Hierro I was relieved but also totally stressed out.

Why am I telling you all this? Because I believe that I still “waste” a lot of energy and time in not accepting how “life goes”. Like with 16 I still try to “change” everything by “fighting” it –in my head. But –as I have learned only recently- this is as impossible as it is to change another person. I seem to have high expectations of my life and everyone else around me. It is only lately that I begin to understand that the only reasonable thing to do is to “let it go”. I can’t help it, if things don’t go “my way”, can’t help it if people see things differently. But there is the possibility of an “inch of freedom”: By deciding which “way” I am going to take: The one battling against everybody and everything or the one accepting that this is just so and that I can take a deep breath and take my dog for a walk. And this is what I wanted to share with you, dear readers, that sometimes we have a choice to “be happy” or “follow the old paths”.  Love

Renate Weber

This is my service dog Kalle. He is one year old and he is still to be trained. I do the training under the supervision of my dog trainer. While my life “before Kalle” was often a struggle to get up or even go outside-especially at the weekends I had to become more self-organized and self-disciplined. And here is the secret: I wouldn’t have done it just for myself. I believe that sometimes it is easier to do these things for another being than for oneself. Yet when Kalle is barking at the moon, old neighbours or even trash cans I frankly do not know who is helping whom here J. It seems that I have even more work on my hands and that the dog is “slow on the uptake” when “lessons” are over and we are outside. But this is not so: Like me he is distracted by millions of smells, noises and movements. And while he can bring things to me while we are in my flat he lets them fall down outside and completely forgets about them J.

Morrie Schwarz[1] once said “As a child and when you get old you need people to help you. But here is the secret: You also need people in between.” That this is more than true I realized when Kalle ran away one day: All my neighbours went in search for him. We found him and got him home safely. Later that evening I understood that Kalle had already “helped” me: Our daily walks had connected me in a positive way with my neighbours. His constant joy when he could “sniff the world outside” had pushed me out of my self-indulged isolation in my flat and the feeling that everything outside is “just too overwhelming”. Without realizing it I had looked over my wall of fear and depression and let go of the past. And even now when I have “reached” the week-end and sleep a lot because I am exhausted and overstimulated my little companion is there with me “behind that wall”. And here is what I wanted to share with you: Even when you feel it is useless and you are only giving-the animals will give it back to you. When Kalle licks my hands comfortingly or sits behind me in the queue of the supermarket to “protect” me I know that all the effort has been worth it.

[1] Albom, Mitch, Tuesdays with Morrie, New York 1997.

This is my family. They are very different (the guinea-pigs hide in caves under the ground, the dog hunts animals) but they give me a Feeling of being at ease and protected. It took some training (and a lot of dog cookies) to make them accept one another. I know that no animal can replace a human being. But since I have got these 3 animals I feel more at home in the world. I wonder less about People who have hurt me in the past because I spend my time outdoors, going for a walk with my dog and looking for herbs for my guinea-pigs. Like this I am more in contact with mother nature and other people. Also I am more generous with my Friends and other people because I feel less lonely. I am more Content with my own life and less dependent on what others do or don’t do. This is what I wanted to share with you, dear Readers.

Dear Readers,

I sometimes feel like my assistance-dog Kalle: Under a huge heap of blankets I try to “recover” and “be myself” again. I then have the feeling that my illness /depression will go on forever. This seems to be something that my dog doesn’t do: Although he was suffering after the operation he could “turn on” to joy more easily (see photo below). Each day we went for a walk a little bit longer. Now he has become his good old self again. When I was diagnosed with “Burnout” and entered the psychosomatic clinic I could not imagine that I would ever feel energetic and happy again. Looking back it had been a long way, but I know now that every step-even the little steps backwarts were worth it. On this Website I put a reading extract describing my time in the psychosomatic clinic. It may be of some help to you.