While I agree with Falcon to some extent, and have commented more on an earlier post he has made to the same effect above, I think perhaps we would need to make some clarifications here.
Many people suffer from depression, both clinical and reactive. That has been established. Panic attacks and phobias are legion. I should know: not only do I work with them every day but "suffer" from some of them myself! (Old joke: "Do you suffer from depression?" "No, I actually quite enjoy it!")
Anyway, my point is this. Anyone with serious mental health issues would (most likely) certainly be advised to reconsider the Camino for the reasons that Falcon gives above. We are speaking of perhaps 2 - 3% here.
However, "the rest of us" - the other 17% who are working their way out of say a broken marriage, a death in the family, an enforced career change, a disappointment in faith, life, reason... Do I have to continue? Those of us who are afraid of heights (me), closed places, and yes even strangers: the agoraphobics, claustrophobics, acrophobics - it sound so much more awful when we use the clinical terms, doesn't it.
I guess what I am trying to say in answer to Falcon's very thoughtful post is that MOST pilgrims have issues. Whether we call them "Mental Health Issues" or not is a very moot point. Just because someone is carrying Prosac or Paxil with their ibuprofin and blister cream should not indicate that perhaps they have made a wrong decision.
In
Pilgrimage to Heresy, Miranda is depressed. Not clinally, not diagnosed, but she is lacking in personal "(w)holeness"; Felix is getting over the death of a loved one; Kieran is gravely ill. Even Alex - who seems to be the mainstay of the other's sanity at times - has an emotional breakdown at one point.
Look at
The Way for example. Is Tom depressed? You betcha; angry too. Sara? The writer? Read almost any of the books chronicling a pilgrim´s progress and you will find characters that are searching for something, tryinmg to fill a whole in their lives. And some, of course, are out and out screwballs! That MAKES the Camino!!!
Don't you think?
In my opinion this is what Beiramar was getting at in the first place.
Every one of us has met the pilgrim that was too needy or intrusive, and they almost always were shunned after their condition had become apparent. The early kindness and sympathy that is found universally in pilgrims wears thin when someone has become a burden.
This may be true. I didn't find this when I walked first in 1999. The people I met recogbnised that being open to the "burdens" of others was part of the lessons of the Camino. If this is the way the Camino is now then perhaps it is a victim now of its own success? For that reason, I would not walk the
Camino Frances again.
P.S.
Only a therapist who has dealt personally with a patient can give qualified advice.
This is pretty poor therapist. Good therapists, and I count myself amongst these, listen. We ask questions and help to steer the client towards finding answers to their own doubts and fears. We do not "give advice". I don't that is what you really meant is it Falcon?
http://www.headstartcentres.org
http://www.pilgrimagetoheresy.com