After three years at Dr. Brauchele’s hospital, she met Rudolf Kroeger, a young man who had just finished his engineering studies. They married three months after their first date. She had a difficult choice to give up a career she loved, since at that time a woman had to give up her job when she got married. But Hanna had fallen head over heels in love, and was ready to start a family. They had two children when Rudolf’s father gave them the down payment to a house and they moved to a small house surrounded by fruit trees, berry bushes, asparagus beds, and a place to grow potatoes, cabbage, and turnips. This property kept them alive during and after the war when they witnessed the starvation, brutal crimes, mind-shattering sadness, and traumatic hostility that are the result of war.