Gabriele Schöttler was born, a few months after the 1953 uprising, in Zehdenick, a small town and an important centre for brick production, set in the marshy flatlands roughly 50 km to the north of Berlin. She completed her school education at an East German "Polytechnic Secondary School" in 1970 and then transferred to the and Berlin-Buch where between 1970 and 1974 she trained and qualified for a nursing career. She then worked as a nurse at the Neurology Clinic in Berlin-Buch between 1974 and 1977. In 1977 she was promoted to the rank of a , continuing her work in the clinic at this level till 1979.