FrieSchLa (Friederike Schmidt-Landwehr) is a qualified mineralogist and was born in Augsburg in 1958. First she studied German in Munich, but then switched to the natural sciences. After graduating from Munster, she got a job as a PhD student.
She then worked in the private sector for eight years, first as a laboratory manager in an agricultural trading company and then for three years as an expert in a geological office.
In 2000, she suffered a brainstem hemorrhage as a result of an accident while pregnant with her third son. This incident fundamentally changed her life. She spent a long time in the intensive care unit and in rehabilitation before coming home in autumn 2001. Since then she has been to the aphasia center in Vechta every day.
Written language and reason are not affected, but there is a speech disorder due to facial paralysis. From their experiences, the need to help people with a similar fate arose: "If you go to the aphasia center for as many years as I have, you can't fail to get a feel for the needs of the aphasic." That's why she wrote the book If you had huge ears and later started the book project Owl Hannes, the book for aphasics, German learners and people who find reading difficult for other reasons.