I was born in 1986 in the not so idyllic city of Veenendaal in the heart of The Netherlands. I was a pretty normal kid and did what kids of that generation did best. In our free time, we were outside all day, every day. Playing in the woods, or close to the local river. From a young age I liked animals and plants a lot, and as they are full of surprises, this has never changed.
Unknowingly, I started training myself as an entomologist around the age of 6. I collected dozens of insect species in glass jars with holes in the lids and – as I wasn’t very good at it yet – my ‘lab’ often ended up a smelly business. A collection of glass jars filled with mush in various stages of decay. I’m not sure what was worse, the mayonnaise bucket filled with ladybugs, or the nest of decaying ermine moths in a glass jar. Although I acted from a place of love and curiosity, I think I gave insects a good reason not to like me in those days. Although I have faint memories of wanting to become a snow man when I was really young, I was determined that I wanted to be ‘a biologist’ at the age of six or so. I probably only had half a clue what this was and probably most of it was based on Discovery Channel… but hey, I had a plan, and (spoiler alert) twenty-some years later I made it real.
I must have been around eight when I fell in love once more. One day, after school was out, I encountered my first reptile, a sand lizard, in the school yard. This lit up an even bigger flame in my heart. I caught it and showed it to my teacher, who told me “Ok cool, release it“. He must not have known me very well. Obviously, I ignored his advice, and instead I kept it and cared for it. It lived for 3 or 4 years more and by my professional opinion at the time, it died happy and of old age. I’m pretty confident it was happy, as by the time it died, I was getting pretty experienced in keeping lizards, from golden geckos and web-toed geckos to green anoles.
When I was ten years old, my family moved to the East of the country. The Netherlands is fairly small, so getting from ‘the center’ to ‘the East’ at the same latitude is only about 70 kilometers. For a ten year-old this is, of course, a ridiculous distance. Needless to say I did not like it at first, although the town was nice enough. Even at small distances, there are sometimes huge cultural differences. Kids being the dead-honest terrorists that they are, the kids in the new place made it pretty clear that I was not one of them. I didn’t really fit in at school in those first few years. The group hierarchy had already established and my fairly late introduction placed me solidly at the bottom of the food chain. As a result, I often focused more on my other interests. I spent most of my free time either along the water, fishing, or taking care of my animals.
Then, for more than a decade everything I did was focused on reptiles. First of course that sand lizard but many more followed. My ‘reptile empire’ grew steadily and by the time I was 18 years old, I bred between 50-100 snakes and lizards each year. Next to that, I kept birds, fish, turtles, praying mantids, and also bred rats and mice as food animals. Quite the zoo… Due to unforeseen and unfortunate economic circumstances, I got rid of most animals some years after I started studying.
In 2006, I started studying Animal Biology at Wageningen University in The Netherlands. Due to some struggles with anxiety and depression, I finished my BSc with some delays 4,5 years later with a bachelor’s thesis on cannibalism in malaria mosquito larvae, with a fantastic supervisor who was very supportive in difficult times. Due to my anxiety struggles, I decided that I would take a break after my Bachelor Degree (and to be honest, I strongly considered to quit studying as a whole). This break was needed as I needed to fight some of my inner demons.
After ending up working night shifts in a wet wipes factory for several months in 2012, it was clear to me that it was time for something else. In pursuit of a life-long dream I traveled to Southeast Asia with my partner. It was clear from day one: A next passion was born. I traveled for several months through beautiful new cultures and biomes that I had never experienced and I loved every second of it. But all good things come to an end. At least this one did.
Back in The Netherlands I did not have any plan. My partner would start her Master’s degree study. But me? What should I do? I took some side jobs to pay the bills, and to figure out what I wanted in life. At one of the jobs in a food microbiology lab one colleague kept reminding me that I wouldn’t be able to finish a master’s degree because of my continuous struggles with anxiety and repetitive strain injury. Although there was some truth in this – my hands, and joints are worthless and I sometimes still struggle – I hated them for sharing this vision of theirs and pointing out my weaknesses in a derogatory manner. One day they made it exceptionally clear that my future was grim, and I was in fact quite worthless. That did it for me. The same day I enrolled for a Master’s degree in bio-interactions at Wageningen University. I learned that sometimes you just need to hear someone say ‘you can’t‘, and that some people should probably try to be better allies.
Because I already took all obligatory Master’s courses as extracurricular courses during my Bachelor’s, I mostly had to finish research projects and write theses. I have been guided by some excellent supervisors during my Master’s theses. In my major project, I studied transmission of potato viruses by various species of aphids and the role of weedy plant species as reservoirs for the virus. In the second, a minor thesis, I studied ovipositor morphology in parasitic wasps in order to find structural relationships between morphology and oviposition substrate types. Entomology had started to emerge as a strong pattern by this time.
To wrap up my Master’s degree, I required a four month internship. My internship brought me to Kuala Lumpur, where I arranged what promised to be a fantastic project. As part of a specific project we would trap various bat species in the jungles of Malaysia in order to analyze their gut content for insect diversity in different forest locations. Due to unforeseen reasons the project was cancelled when I arrived there. No one was to blame, but it was a bit unfortunate that I was told this during my first meeting at the institute. The alternative project offer was not what I had hoped for. I could basically sit out my time and chew on some already collected data in a smelly, damp and overheated broom closet in KL. I certainly had some tough choices to make in a very short time with very few people to discuss these issues with. That week in KL was perhaps one of the darkest episodes in my life. My demons feasted on my brain and well-being. It fucked me up pretty good. I stayed in a pre-paid room without windows, pretty much constantly confused about the time of day. I could barely eat and lost 7 kilos of body weight in a few days. It was one giant anxiety blur. On a Saturday morning, I booked the first available flight home. Back to The Netherlands, where I had no home anymore, no alternative internship… (but I still had my partner, luckily).
It took me about eight weeks to recover from this mess. We were lucky to find a new place to live rather quickly. Having a home is so important for mental well-being. I notice this over and over again. Meanwhile, I made some attempts at contacting biocontrol companies to find an internship position closer to home – without much success.
My last hope was with an insect ecologist at The Netherlands Institute of Ecology. I will be honest. This was the last place I wanted to be. This had absolutely nothing to do with the institute, but more with my pride. The institute was located literally across the street from my university. Applying here would be the easy way out and in a way felt like a failure to me.
It took a few persistent e-mail bombs to get a response from the ecologist. But eventually I got one! Sure, I could start an internship with him!! Soon I had an intake meeting with him and ended up in a torrential stream of information about plant-herbivore interactions, host-parasitoid interactions and more along those lines. I ended up doing all of the projects we discussed. Let’s say I found my place. We had a very fruitful five month project together and I learned a lot from him (and still do).
My newfound mentor pushed me to apply for a PhD position at the institute. Something with plant-soil feedbacks. I loved plants, but had no clue about soil back then. I was ensured that the project would involve plants and insects, too. To be honest, I was scared. Of course my inner demons did not like the idea at all. This may have been one of the most reasons I applied. I can only guess why I was chosen to work at The Netherlands Institute of Ecology. I think my mentor may have exaggerated my skills a bit at the time… Thanks for this, Jeff!
I think I made up a bit for the lack of conceptual knowledge about soil ecology. I submitted my PhD thesis in June 2019, three months ahead of schedule and two weeks before the birth of my son. I defended it in December 2019. All my Chapters had by then been published in reputable peer-reviewed journals. The thesis was awarded best thesis of 2019 by the Institute of Biology in Leiden, which meant it was one of the eight candidates for best thesis of Leiden University. By the time I defended my thesis, I had been offered several post-doc positions. I ended up accepting my current position at the Technical University of Munich, in the Terrestrial Ecology Research Group. This meant I had to leave Wageningen and my home country behind and move to Freising, Germany, where I still live with my partner and our two beautiful kids. I think we have rooted here pretty well, if I may say so myself.
Who knows what the future holds? I have learned that the world is full of surprises.
For those that made it till the end. Thanks. There is no award or prize, but I appreciate you for reading! Say hi, follow me on Instagram, Twitter or offer me a project (a man can dream).
Cheers!
Robin
Robin Heinen 