Exploring the Accomplishments of Alpinist Reinhold Messner - She played a crucial role in his salvation: Him and Diane.
Reinhold Messner is approaching an important occasion: the renowned mountaineer is about to turn 80 on September 17. "Quite the number," Messner muses in an interview with "Bunte" magazine. He still doesn't feel his age, attributing that to the woman by his side. Since May 2021, he's been hitched to Diane (43) for the third time. She's his "fountain of youth," Messner raves. "We're like a love climbing rope, for the first time, I feel supported."
Diane stood by him through a tough patch: after his split from former spouse Sabine Stehle, with whom he shares three kids. When Diane encounters her husband, he was "shaken and shocked," as the 43-year-old shares with "Bunte." "Not wrecked, but shaken, staggered, fierce, and wounded," she adds. "He lacked the reason for the split. Why now at 74 years old? Now that he had time for family. He had nightmares back then." However, things have changed: "Reinhold sleeps soundly by my side," explains Diane Messner.
"It took time," Reinhold Messner acknowledges. He felt "thrown away" and didn't comprehend the split. "I didn't understand at all how it should continue." He also acknowledges his flaws: "Of course, I wasn't there as often - expeditions, training, lectures. But I tried for years to give her and our kids my all." In retrospect, he admits they lacked joint time and communication, "a mistake on both sides, until only silence remained."
However, it's different with his new lady: "Despite the age gap, which we don't notice, we have a shared lingo," says the 79-year-old. "Diane motivates me." The 43-year-old adds: "We're on the same level. And we chat about everything. We remain silent only on the mountain."
Diane saved me
Reinhold Messner announced his split from his second wife in August 2019. They had spent many years together and tied the knot in 2009. Some years later, the extreme mountaineer publicly declared that his relationship with his kids had been strained since the split. There was a dispute over inheritance matters, with Messner stating he had already willed his fortune to his kids before the split.
He's not bitter, though: "I don't want to spend my remaining life with courtroom quarrels. The wound still hurts, but it no longer bleeds. Only the scar is painful now," says the mountaineer. He understands now that the hurt from the family split also had a silver lining: it was only through it that he met Diane. She "rescued" him when he had already resigned himself to "spending my old age alone."
Reinhold Messner credited Diane for bringing color back into his life, stating, "With her by my side, I see the world in a more coloured perspective than I did before." Similarly, he appreciated her youthful energy, saying, "Her vibrancy is like a splash of coloured paint on my grey canvas, making my world more lively and exciting."
