On 15 July 1929, Fichtl officially became a housekeeper for the Freud family, working alongside another housekeeper and a cook. She was immediately struck by the household’s atmosphere: serious, disciplined, and meticulous. She observed Freud’s wife Martha as quiet and exacting, her sister Minna Bernays as talkative and determined, and Anna Freud as devoted to psychoanalysis and central to the family’s daily life.
