by Leo Walker. Today would be my mom’s birthday. As kids growing up, it was obvious to us that there was something different about her. I tell people she had schizophrenia although strictly speaking I never heard that diagnosis said. In fact, I never heard any specific explanation for her unusual and at times frightening behavior. My dad was a very private person and felt things like that were best not talked about, even within the family.

by Vera Hurst aka “Missing Kink”. I have always been an outdoor, rugged kind of girl. Spending hours in the yard looking at bugs, walking barefoot in the yard, playing baseball and catching tadpoles were the things that took up my time as a child. Through Girl Scouting, I learned to camp, make fire and live. It felt like home being in a tent in the wilderness. But, I grew up, went to college, met someone, got married, had kids. Life showed up with its stressors and hormonal issues and anger. It was normal to feel upset when you had all this happening at the same time, right? Back then doctors dismissed these things as woman’s problems and I was just told to deal with it.

by Ray Coffield / Beep. I #hikeOctober because HIKE for Mental Health came into my life 2 years ago in 2015. It was like getting a real purpose to my obsession (goal, bucket list, or whatever you want to call it) with hiking. Knowing that the accomplishment of my enjoyment can help others makes it even better. I think the Appalachian Trail became a goal when my fourth grad teach talked about being out on a trail, for 6 months, living in a tent, and hiking for miles and miles.

by Ally Lang. I #hikeOctober because the outdoors is my happy place. I discovered in my early 20’s that staying in one place was, at once; uncomfortable , yet what most of society expected – settling down. Add to that a multi-focal mental illness diagnosis and it spelled disaster. From and even earlier age, I’ve always felt more calm outdoors. Nature has that healing quality that seems to be neglected as technology moves us indoors. It slows me. I thinking of hiking as a medicine. Forget to take it and my system is thrown into a dysfunctional state.

by Matthew “Odie” Norman. I #hikeOctober because I want to help overcome the stigma of mental illness and hiking helps me deal with my own battles of anxiety and depression. My first overnight backpacking trip was also the first night on my thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail in 2013. To be honest, I was running away from a life I could no longer manage. I had self-medicated and self-internalized to deal with what I saw as a failing life. The stigma of mental disorder is very real and as a result I would hide my suffering from the world to “fit in.”

I’m Casey Chon, and I #hikeOctober to raise awareness of diversity and of the outdoors. In third grade, I read a book called Halfway to the Sky. My nine-year-old self became obsessed with the Appalachian Trail and hiking. However, growing up in the suburbs of New York City, I was nowhere near the Appalachian Trail, and you can’t really go hardcore hiking in the suburbs. I played a lot of sports, but never went camping and did “real” outdoors-y things.

by Hotrock. I grew up in a broken household, my father had problems with alcohol and left our family when I was 12. I lost that father figure to look up to, and many of life lessons that only a father and son share. I had to make a lot of decisions on my own, unfortunately most were not the right ones. I job hopped for many years. In 2001 my father died, and I decided to hike the Appalachian Trail. I brought him with me — his ashes were in my pack the whole way.

by Laura Skorich. Hiking makes me feel more empowered, inspired, energized, free, grounded. Strong yet know I am but a speck in this great big world. Knowing I can find my inner strength and complete an extremely difficult hike, like Mt Whitney, reaffirms that I am strong and can get through the hard times if I just focus and take action. Hiking fills me with awe and curiosity, allows me to escape the noise and stress of every day life, helps me free my mind and feeds my soul…

by Joe O’Donnell. I #hikeOctober because in nature, there isn’t stigma, the need to covering up mental illness and emotional pain.  Nature itself provides some healing, but so do the people you meet walking and reflections and insights you have along the way.  This was my experience in 2015, when I completed an Appalachian Trail thru-hike fundraising for HIKE for Mental Health.  I haven’t done anything nearly as big since, but I carry with me the lessons I learned from that experience.

by Sue Twombley. Officially, mental illness has been a part of my life for nearly twenty years, but I now know that I’ve suffered from it nearly all of my life. It all came to a head in 2011 when I was officially diagnosed with Bi-Polar Since that time I have been receiving proper medication and I’m doing better than I have in years but it doesn’t and can’t end there.

by Brandon “Flying Crow”. Many of us suffer from mental illness in one form or another. Many of us tend to be silent. I know it’s not the best thing to do but finding it better to open up and sharing with others is. Connecting with others on or off the trails and being able to sharing our experiences has also shown me that we are not alone. There are so many out there affected by mental illness more than we know. I know I have had my share of moments with depression and to me hiking is a way to ground myself.

by Lexi Gross. Whether I am out alone or with friends, hiking or trail running, being in nature invites me to bring my whole self along. Hiking and trail running are the easiest ways for me to be present and connect my mind and body. These activities help keep my inner child alive and well. It is hard for my carefree, laughing self not to show up when I am scrambling across rocks along creeks, chasing salamanders and crawdads in streams, or bounding down trails as fast as my legs can carry me. Allowing myself to connect with this part of myself brings clarity and stillness to my often overactive mind.

by Tom Kennedy. I hike October, because it was 2011 when a strange set of circumstances brought three souls together. It was in Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey. At the time Leo was living in Toronto, Nancy in the Houston area of Texas and me in New Jersey. At that time I didn’t think that this happenstance was a life changer but it was. One day over dinner at a local Holiday Inn, we decided that we wanted to do something to give back, something to do with hiking. So Leo said, Okay, let’s think about this, why do we hike? I immediately said. “We HIKE for Mental Health.

by Karen Viola. I hike for mental health. I enjoy doing it with others, but it is medicinal for me when I bring just my self along. With paper and a pen. This ‘treatment’ began years ago in a small wooded park near my workplace at the time, as a self-prescribed way to revive my ‘here and now’, which was being squeezed lifeless by the grip of where I’d been and where I was going. These little doses of solo time helped me notice for the sake of noticing. My sketchbooks filled with twisted roots, vines, and weathered stumps still alive with decay. Sentinel trees interacted and posed in a magical theater of the round. How had I missed all this before? I became enamoured with the very concept of a blazed trail, a scrolling menu of sensory delights and in-season specials… it made me hungry for more.

by Brayden Donnelly. Today, on October 1st, 2017, my 23rd birthday, I choose success. Success in finding happiness through friends and family. Success in advocating for the continued conversation surrounding mental health stigmas. Success in capturing the beauty of, and protecting the importance of, our shared trails and outdoor spaces. In a relatively short period of time I was both unfortunate and fortunate enough to have experienced the highs, lows, and confusion of anxiety disorder and depression. I #hikeOctober because I finally understand that the only way to change the world is to put one foot in front of the other.