I have been following this thread for the past few days and have thought long and hard about responding. So many people have misconceptions about mental illness and there is still such stigma about admitting that you have one.

The short answer is yes, I believe it can be done. I am a firm believer in healing thru hiking, actually thru any rigorous physical activity; activity of choice for me is hiking. Not that I have done a thru hike yet but, that is my opinion, take it for what it is worth. This is a long story so if that is enough of an answer, you may want to stop here.

I have had three major depressive episodes and I have PTSD. I was raped when I was 11 years old. At the time, I truly thought I was going to be killed. I did not understand what was happening to me and that increased the fear exponentially. Immediately after the rape I had my first major depressive episode (go figure), compounded by all the classic symptoms of PTSD. It was 1973 and there wasn’t that much known of PTSD and its association with depression. So, while I got psych treatment, it wasn’t on the level of what is available today. The depression hit again when I was in my early twenties and the last time started in 1999. That last one was the big one. I was dangerously suicidal. I was put on medication and ended up out of work for 10 months due to side effects and I just couldn’t cope with my job. We tried a bunch of different medications. The one that we finally settled on worked somewhat but, I was taking a massive dose and still had serious breakthrough depression symptoms. I was finally able to go back to work. However, I was still in very rough shape. I put in my time on the job and went home and crawled into bed at 6:00 and stayed there until I had to leave for work the next day. And… what does all this have to do with hiking? I will tell you.

One day the man I had been dating before the “crash” showed up at my door with a dog. And not some cute cuddly little well behaved animal. The vet figured Diogee was about 2 years old. A wild beast of a german shepherd/black lab mix who had been abused, never had lived in a house, had spent the past 7 months in a shelter serving as evidence in an animal abuse case, wasn’t house trained (or anything trained for that matter), was severely underweight at 65 lbs. and had massive separation anxiety issues. The first time I left him alone in the house he went from window to window knocking things over and tearing down all the curtains trying to get out. Great gift, huh? For the first two months I can’t tell you how hard I tried to give him away. Here I was, barely taking care of myself and I had this needy manic beast in my face constantly. And what do you do with a dog? You walk him. At first it was around the block three times a day. That was all I could manage. But, that wasn’t enough. I had to do something with him to burn off all of his anxiety. We started going to a state park near my house on the weekends and hiking the trails. I hadn’t done any hiking for years and years. Eventually we started going to the state park every day after work. After a while I was going in the morning before work and putting in a couple of miles and then again after work and doing a few more miles. Whatever I was up to. After a while I started looking forward to getting outside with him. I hadn’t looked forward to anything, literally, for almost three years. In the middle of winter, about six months into this routine, I was daily sneaking into the park to hike in the dark after work. One day we stopped on the edge of a meadow looking out over the fresh snow in the moonlight. I looked down at the now 105 lb dog sitting quietly next to me sniffing the breezes, and I was happy. Truly happy. I didn’t want to be anywhere else, I didn’t want to be anyone else, and I didn’t want to die. I wanted to keep hiking with him forever.

I believe that all that hiking is what finally started turning things around for me. Certainly there were other contributing factors but, most of them had been in place for a while before Diogee came to live with me and they hadn’t been enough. Having him there forced me to get outside, walking into the world again. And while Diogee was a rescue from a shelter, by hiking with him, he really rescued me.

So yes, go do your thru hike. You never know, it might be the rescue of you.