A walk should not have to become a logistical nightmare

About chronic overstimulation, a life that keeps shrinking, and longing for a place where going outside does not require hours of preparation.
Instead of editing the many dozens of photos I took yesterday at the Tree Museum, I am once again trying to throw our story into the ether here. Searching for that one person, like for example Inge, who might think: “Maybe I can really help them.” Or perhaps reaching a large group of people all thinking: “Yes, I can help a little.”
What for others is a simple walk has gradually become a complete military operation for us. Yesterday morning the weather looked like it might turn worse than expected. The beach still seemed like the best idea: Fannar’s favourite place. But in the north of the country the weather was beautiful, only for us that is simply far too far away and there we miss the nature we actually long for: forests and elevation changes. On top of that it is still holiday season, so the beach would probably be far busier than normal.
Nijmegen kept haunting our minds. Hills. Spring. Forests with fresh leaves. And as the cherry on top for Fannar, maybe afterwards a quick visit to the animals at the Tiergarten just across the border in Germany.
But for us the weather now has to be almost perfect before we dare invest the energy, stress, time and fuel costs required just to go for a morning walk at all. Eventually we decided to go on Friday instead.
After that we could no longer truly rest, but we stayed in bed anyway. Around seven o’clock Mart put on the training trousers he only wears when taking Fannar to the small nearby park. Meanwhile the sky kept clearing further. I tried not to give in to it and had deliberately not prepared anything, but eventually I still sent Mart a message: “Shall we go after all?”
We would never make it to Nijmegen if, as usual, we also had to be back home within an hour. So we decided to go to the Tree Museum again and afterwards maybe to the Lek so Fannar could cool down and play with his ball.
The entire time I tried to rationalise my own thoughts. Because honestly? I still do not know whether it was worth it. Driving so much on back roads just to reduce the chance of police checks, only to end up in a small area we have already walked through dozens of times by now. A place that becomes more crowded by the minute. Where Fannar constantly has to stay on leash even though he loves running freely. Where we eventually leave through the emergency exit because the entrance and parking lot completely overwhelm us. We are almost always the youngest people there, apart from a few small children who are immediately redirected to the playground at the edge of the park.
Afterwards we drove to the Lek, but the only quiet spot turned out to be a place where dogs were technically not allowed. Meanwhile I was constantly being attacked by flies and realised I had stepped on a nail that kept stabbing my foot with every step. So in between we also had to walk back to the car to get my old spare shoes with holes in them.
And meanwhile one thought kept circling through my head: “Maybe we should have just gone to Nijmegen.” But at the same time I tried reminding myself that we could also have stayed home, like we usually do the other five or six days of the week. That being outside is almost always better than being trapped indoors. Sometimes I wonder whether I am gaslighting myself with that thought. But somewhere I think that rationalising is the only thing still keeping us going a little. Because by now so much depends on something as simple as a walk that every choice starts to feel as though it could turn out wrong. Maybe that is what chronic stress does to a person: even rest itself begins to feel suspicious.
When we got home, not even an hour later, Mart cleaned himself up while I gathered water and supplies for our room upstairs. Afterwards I cleaned myself up, changed clothes and decided to prepare extensive overnight oats for Friday, so we could still have a “real” walk then. The weather looked far more promising again. But Nijmegen fell through anyway, because my mother goes to visit my grandmother on Friday afternoons. That means we really have to be home on time, because then we have much less time to do all the things we normally still do before she comes back downstairs again.
So we did everything “right”. Ate early. Went to bed early. Tried to calm down in time. Packed water bottles. Prepared everything so Friday would not fail again. But this morning we woke up at 04:15. And if you know us, you know that means the rest is permanently gone. From then on we just lie there waiting for the alarm while our heads start spinning harder and harder. With Mart that completely tipped over into panic this time. Fear of bad luck with the car. Fear of police checks. Fear of breaking down on the road. And it does not help that he is the only one who can drive, causing him to feel responsible for literally everything until we are safely back home.
After that it hit me too. Not even fear exactly, but mainly stress and depressive thoughts. Because I also always have those anxious thoughts during the drive: “What if we break down here along the motorway? Would I even still be able to walk home?” But at the same time I do not want that fear to decide that we simply should not walk at all. Because that automatically means another full day indoors at my mother’s house. A day revolving around:
making food,
cleaning,
being quieter the moment my mother rests,
constantly hearing someone calling, talking, walking around,
searching for solutions,
trying not to become overstimulated in a room that no longer feels like living space.
So yes, then give me that constant anxiety during the drive. Because at least then we are together. With Fannar. On the road toward nature. Away from here. And the problems on the road at least feel like our own problems, instead of the endless mental pressure constantly weighing on us at home.
Still, from half past four onward I kept checking the weather again. It kept looking cloudier. Only the northeast still looked beautiful, but that was too far away anyway. So I started analysing everything all over again. Did we do the right thing by going yesterday after all? Should we have driven to Nijmegen anyway? Should I try to convince Mart to go because there is a big party in the street further down and we would probably arrive home after a walk anyway? These thoughts are slowly driving me insane.
Because in reality we do not even have luxurious dreams at all. We simply need a place where we can go outside every day without that requiring preparation, anxiety, stress and money beforehand. A place where we can look out the window and only a heavy rainstorm keeps us indoors. Where a walk is not a military operation.
People often see a car as luxury. We experience the exact opposite. For us true luxury would mean not needing a car at all to find a moment of peace. No APK stress. No fuel prices. No fear of bad luck or fines. Just being able to move because nature is nearby.
Yesterday I was desperately looking forward to simply not being at home for a while. To move my body. To experience nature in spring. To hear birds. And above all to see a happy Fannar. Instead, once again we ended up trapped between short-term and long-term thinking. Walking is short term. Writing, searching, trying to earn money and working on the camper feels like long term. Mart tries to earn money. I write in the hope of finding like-minded people and perhaps people willing to help us financially.
And meanwhile this morning I even suggested that during the weekend we should finally go early to the camper to install the diesel tank underneath and clean everything after the mouse infestation. But the moment I think about the camper, I immediately feel resistance.
This morning I realised again that the camper no longer feels like freedom, but like something that is freezing our lives in place. When we bought it, in autumn 2023, we were desperate. Since summer 2021 we had barely gone outside anymore. We were convinced we had to get away from old and new as quickly as possible and could never return to my mother’s house again. Mart looked at smaller vans, but they seemed too small. Too little space. Not high enough to truly live in. If only we had known then what we know now… that we would still be here. That we would ultimately keep using the car. That Fannar would survive old and new. Then we would probably have used those €7000 savings to repair the car and buy a small van instead of this large camper. And that realisation hurts enormously. Because it feels as though our entire life has been shaped by wrong choices. As if that too has cost us years.
We could already have spent three summers going on adventures with a simple van or just the car itself, repaired or not. Instead we have now paid thousands of euros in storage costs for a camper we cannot even use and are not even allowed to sell because it was seized.
And often my heart breaks when I think about Fannar. That with some luck he may live fifteen summers, but has only truly been able to experience two of them the way he needs.
And maybe that is ultimately why I keep writing. Because I cannot believe that in a world where some people genuinely do not know what to do with their money anymore, there are no people left who understand how relatively “simple” our situation actually is to solve. Not with luxury. Not with a perfect life. But simply with a safe foundation. A car that passes APK. Or a small reliable van that can simply stand outside the door instead of in expensive storage. Or a piece of land where we can finally find peace. Because only then will there be room to work on the rest of our problems. Not while we are still living 24/7 in a childhood bedroom, surrounded by overstimulation, without privacy, without recovery, without the ability to simply be partners instead of housemates trying to survive.
Our goal has actually become very simple: a small reliable van we can temporarily live in, with which we can more easily seek out peace and finally drive around looking for land. After that we hope to rent land, temporarily place our old camper there as a fixed place, repair our old car ourselves and eventually perhaps even sell the van again to continue finishing the camper. No luxury dream. Just an attempt to finally live a little again.