After her illness last year, Martina Voss-Tecklenburg feels energetic and full of zest for life again. But she is selective when looking for a new job – for good reason.
Former national coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg is currently ruling out a job outside of Germany for personal reasons. She has recently turned down three offers “because I don’t want to go abroad. That doesn’t fit into my current life situation. I enjoy spending time with my family. I haven’t had enough of that over the last 40 years,” said the 56-year-old in an interview with the Swiss newspaper “Blick”.
Her illness, which led to her retirement as national coach last November, had a major impact on her future planning. She noticed “that I no longer want certain things. Ten years ago I would have signed up to them all. According to the motto: It doesn’t matter where, it doesn’t matter how, the main thing is that I can be a coach again,” reported Voss-Tecklenburg.
Job as a consultant conceivable
Although she does not want to rule out a return to the coaching bench, it is not a given. “I no longer have to be in the front row. I am currently dealing with questions that would not have even occurred to me in my mid-40s. How much pressure of expectations, pressure to achieve results and mental pressure do I still want in my life? Thanks to my decades of experience, I can also imagine a job as a consultant,” said Voss-Tecklenburg.
A good year after her breakdown following the botched World Cup in Australia, the former national coach, who held the post for five years and led the DFB women to European Championship silver in 2022, feels the energy she needs again. “The joy of life is back,” she said.
Panic attacks and lots of tears
That was completely different in the summer of 2023. “I just cried, couldn’t think clearly and couldn’t answer any questions. I was empty. There was nothing left, there was nothing inside me,” reported the 125-time national player. “I had panic attacks.”
With her story, she wanted to “make people aware that a mental illness should be assessed in the same way as a physical illness. For a while, it was dismissed as a fashionable illness. It was not taken seriously at all, or along the lines of: it is simply not resilient,” said Voss-Tecklenburg.
Source: Stern
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