Thread 6: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The Observer The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

Second article in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-whats-in-the-book-and-what-the-observer-has-found

Third item in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-the-truth-behind-the-blockbuster-book-video

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Thread 5 Thread 5: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet

Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement Raynor Winn

NB Please be careful when it comes to naming or implicating people who aren't in the public eye or have no connection to the story, especially where details are unclear or still emerging i.e. DON'T DO IT.

Keep on the path. No saltiness. Thank you.

New posters welcome. It would be helpful to read at least the three Observer articles before posting.

"And if publishing companies don't want to do their due diligence then quite frankly they need to stop publishing this stuff"

Exactly!

Maybe the publishers don't care whether its true or not as long as it's interesting. If it turns out to be lies, they can just blame the author. There should be guidelines on this.

Being cautious about questioning the reality of someone's rare neurological condition doesn't make me a mug. I haven't even read the book or seen the film, so it is not as though I have some investment in wanting it all to be true.

Until SW produced the NHS letters I was as massively sceptical about TW's health as I am about the rest of the tale. Now I am on the fence about that element, (although I do think the terminal diagnosis might be playing fast and loose with the truth).

Which the big issue should have picked up as being a lie. There's no having to be ill enough for a council house. They may have been denied top band due to not having proof of an illness being made worse by their current housing but that doesn't mean you can't go on the waiting list for housing.

@SwetSwetSwet I didn’t see the series but the book sounds interesting - I’ll download it on my kindle.

Totally agree with you @Nameychangington

I feel like I could give you more medical evidence of my mild asthma than the Winns can give you about a serious and rare terminal condition which they’ve hinged a career on. It’s obscene and as a random on the internet I give not two shits if people think I’m mean in not giving these charlatans the benefit of the doubt. Disabled and ill people aren’t taken seriously because of people like this, not because people like me don’t go along with it.

Does she ever criticise Moth? He’s like Jesus giving to the poor etc. I am mid way through book 2.

There's no doubt from what we have seen the Moth has some progressive illness, and that's not what anybody wants for anyone. But the premise of the book which has been repeated in a number of interviews, was they lost their home and in the same week the Moth got a diagnosis that he had a terminal illness and, as said on a number of times in interviews, he was given 2 years to live. This was the basis for their life affirming decision to wander off on a walk. So that has to be the truth, or the rest of the books has no connection. Nothing else really matters. And those two fundamental aspects should have been checked as fact by the publishers. They don't need to check how much she stole on the walk, or if she had a shit every 10km or ate cucumbers, but two things are absolutely fundamental to the book and needed to be trueful. Neither of things that you lose exactrecollection of, unless they are not true.

If I look at the reasons why this has made me so upset there are a lot of factors. I feel sorry for Ros Hemmings and her late husband. I feel sorry for Bill Cole. I mostly feel sorry for the people who have diagnosed conditions who have been mislead.

My DH has been bedbound for 2 and a half years now and by bedbound, cannot get out at all, has very limited mobility even in bed and the last time he was hoisted (ages ago) it was appalling for him. He has a raft of things causing this, possibly one of them neurological but we're at a stage where any diagnosis is pointless. The main reason is he was already unwell with several conditions, got Covid and was left in bed for weeks in hospital (I couldn't see him and had it too) and lost the closely nurtured mobility he had. It is shit and awful and grinding and I know it is the same for many, many people, some much younger than us. There may well be something in trying to maintain strength and muscle tone for as long as possible with any condition because we both really tried for years and dragged him back to a (not great) baseline more than once.

I however do not believe brain scans suddenly reverse and damage disappears. I just don't and if Raymoth are saying that, they should offer such before and after scans up for medical scrutiny and frankly, international research and have verification they have done so.

Sorry for the rant guys.

Edit for typo

I think if you are evicted / have no home you would get priority anyway? Even if it was for B&B accommodation for example

She is still madly in love and raging against the dying of the light. That is one of the key straplines.

Sorry this was meant to be in reply to the query about council housing

Thanks. Believe me it’s possible to be madly irritated as well as above but not strapline etc as you say.

A genuine true CBD patient isn't going to find it a problem to provide brain scan reports and other medical documents proving their disease.

The Walkers have written and published books detailing Moth's grossly exaggerated alleged symptoms, so they can hardly say providing solid evidence is invading their privacy can they.

There's a wonderful cancer charity called "Something to Look Forward to" that gives cancer patients various types of gifts. Before doing that they request concrete evidence of your diagnosis such as dated medical letters and reports. I sent them mine and they gave me a week's holiday in East Anglia. I was deeply touched by the gift and I will never forget the kindness of the owner of that holiday home (and of that charity).

Genuine patients with serious health conditions and genuine disabled people gain from proper thorough checks that the diagnosis is genuine and the severity matches what the person is saying. It's the fakers who get caught out like the Walkers.

Who was in North Wales first - the Grifters or his parents?

I am so sorry. My DH has a very rare neurological condition. He is not bed bound (though sadly some people with his condition end up that way) and it is hard enough for us, I can't imagine what it must be like for you both.

Eta: that is a good idea about the brain scans. They could hand them over to an independent neurologist for scrutiny.

Exactly.

It makes others dismiss horrific conditions such as CBD etc as very minor and curable by going on a walk.

Moth was supposedly terminal within 2 years in 2013. Then he said he had 2 months to live in October 2021.

The NHS documents they have shared state he has a very mild and indolent condition.

The Walkers are so disgusting I have no words.

Thanks. That also calls into question the editorial decisions by the publication.

https://www.raynorwinn.co.uk

So her statement does concede there was some altercation with her employer leading to police questioning her, doubling down that the loan from C was money owed originally, that her DH has had a diagnosis with letters as receipts, even if milder, and that the photo taken was not her French bando but a family member's.

Having read all that, the Observer admits the photo but stands by the rest?

https://observer.co.uk/culture/books/article/fact-and-fiction-raynor-winn-wont-talk-to-us-but-heres-what-she-said-about-our-story

Am I caught up?

The other problem is that when people lie or exaggerate health conditions they embolden other fraudsters and leads to a reduction in trust

it makes me think of Grenfell and how there were people turning up getting clothes and money because they claimed they’d escaped and they hadn’t been anywhere near. So next time there’s a disaster like that it’s going to be harder for the survivors

You're right @MrsKypp - and there's nothing at all wrong in asking for proof. It's due diligence on behalf of the charity.

All the waffle about trust between a writer and their publisher. No one is going to bat an eyelid if a publisher of memoirs like this spent an hour checking out a diagnosis and seeing if it matched the book's timeline.

Outside publishing, it's a perfectly normal thing to do.

Thank you @PandoraSocks and I wish you and your DH the very, very best.

Yes but writers are very special and delicate people and you couldn’t possibly risk offending them by asking some tricky questions

This is exactly what it looks like!

It sounds so ridiculously precious to say that asking for proof of a medical condition would break the trust between publisher and author.

How pretentious!

THIS is an example why it matters.

And it matters A LOT

I am so sorry @Uricon2 to hear about your husband. Thinking of you both.

I agree with every word you said.

I hope the Observer, lawyers and neurologists get to read the scan reports / see the scans. I even doubt many scans have even been done. 2011 showed no abnormality. What date did and what abnormality exactly?