Thread 11: 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 ...
2nd Observer https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-whats-in-the-book-and-what-the-observer-has-found
3rd Observer https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-the-truth-behind-the-blockbuster-book-video
4th Observer ‘I felt I was being gaslit’ – the landlord who helped Ray...
Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement Raynor Winn
Thread One www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5368194-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 2 Thread 2. To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet
Thread 3 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5369425-thread-3-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 4 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5370609-thread-4-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
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
Thread 6 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5372494-thread-6-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-
husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 7 www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5373425-thread-7-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 8 www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5375023-thread-8-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 9 www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5376712-thread-9-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 10 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amibeingunreasonable/5378984-thread-10-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

New posters welcome. It would be helpful to read at least the four Observer items above before posting. There are currently 10 items on The Observer website The real Salt Path | The Observer

To all - Please be extremely cautious when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no direct connection to the story, and around the understandable health speculations, especially where details are unclear or still emerging. Please do not engage with visitors who seem to have their own agenda and seek to derail. Avoid @'ing and quoting them as - from experience - this will only encourage them back to the threads. We have done amazingly well together for ten very interesting, very serious and very silly threads so far. I can't be here as much as I'd like so all help with keeping our discussion walking along in a healthy and civil fashion is very welcome.

No saltiness. Keep to the path.

Does stolen fudge taste better?

Hi to everyone here and apologies for the long post. I’ve been hovering over these threads for days and have just joined.
Where to start?! I read an interview in a Cornwall Life home and garden 2022, plugging Landlines. This is where I was drawn in. I was fascinated, awestruck with this woman. I needed to read her books and I did, in quick succession. I raved about them to my family and friends. SW came to my town where the film was being shown in a little independent cinema and did a QA session before the showing. I was too late getting tickets for that and they sold out but I treated four of us to the next day’s showing and a meal afterwards. Then the revelations hit the news. I was completely shocked. I couldn’t believe it and have read everything I could find since. I think I had a bit of a sad crush on Salray… I waived away her seemingly defensive criticisms of other people in her writings as just being the result of depression from everything that had allegedly happened to her. I forgave her for all the negative things that come across about her personality because I fell in love with her, with them, with their journey. My stomach crunched when I read about their ewe dying and I cried. I felt so powerfully connected because this was a “true” story, not fiction! I am not the most savvy of people. I was so surprised to read book reviews written before these revelations hit the fan, by people who hadn’t enjoyed the books and who had seen discrepancies all along. I went from shock and disbelief to a feeling of foolishness at having been duped. I’m guilty of falling in with the romance of their… I’ll call it a “brand” (now) because that’s how it was sold to me and I gave my money willingly. I’m so grateful for these threads. I came across them whilst searching news. I’m disgusted at what SW did when she stole so much money. I agree wholeheartedly with everyone who points out the irony of being silenced with the words “be kind” whilst the author of these three books skulks about and accuses everyone of “pouring vitriol” on her. Very conveniently she takes the high road and tries to shame the very people she conned.

The consultant prior to TSP almost seemed to write him off ‘don’t get over tired & be careful on the stairs’. A routine apt where consultant gave a terminal diagnosis. This sounds like bad practice to me (?)

“Functional Neurological Disorder (FND)” is NOT a sign of “subconscious turmoil” please stop psychologising symptoms which aren’t well researched. FND is increasingly used where people likely have fibromyalgia, Long Covid or ME/CFS.

The NHS has some basic information you might like to familiarise yourself with

https://www.nhsinform.scot/illnesses-and-conditions/brain-nerves-and-spinal-cord/functional-neurological-disorder/ which states issues with “brain signalling”

You do have the right to register with a GP even if you are ‘of no fixed abode’, but you should have either a post office address or get letters sent to the GP/ request no letters.

All that said, the analysis our more knowledgeable thread colleagues have shared along with the JI interview and Bill Cole’s similar experience with Timmoth (when he told him that the doctors didn’t want him planning beyond Christmas- he told both these sympathetic and supportive men something appalling and shocking and certainly in BC’s case, demonstrably untrue- why?) make me very, very sceptical that the illness is anything more than a plot device at best or a full-on scam at worst. Maybe these two think up their scams together and this one is the ultimate. Both knowing about the embezzlement, maybe there have been other crimes along the way. Maybe it was a way at first of adding extra drama to TSP: wouldn’t it be even better, even more inspiring and interesting, if one of them was to be ill?

@Fandango52

Surely a big thing on your mind when managing a chronic condition (whether terminal or not) is easy access to a GP and hospital?

Absolutely. Particularly with a serious n/degenerative condition, where you could have a crisis, deteriorate suddenly or react badly to medicine any day without warning.

Surely, they must have had an address for correspondence. They were on benefits in TSP weren't they?

@LetsBeSensible I'm sorry I upset you with this comment. I do feel I need to explain it better. I know well that functional neurological disorders are very real and can be very distressing.

But if you read the link that you included, it acknowledges that the causes can be many, varied, unknown, but can include
"the brain trying to get rid of a painful sensation; the brain shutting down a part or all of the body in response to a situation it thinks is threatening; In some people, stressful events in the past or present can be relevant to FND. In others, stress is not relevant."

And the subconscious brain is going to be involved in all these possibilities.

It's not "psychologising symptoms" to acknowledge that the mind and body are intertwined, and that when either mind or body is uneasy or unwell, it can have a knock-on effect on the other.

I'm not going to labour this point as it's not really relevant to the subject of this series of threads, but acknowledging this interplay between mind/body is an important part of dealing with dis-ease and disease.

Did they feel they had to make things more dramatic if a film was in offing? So very few books make it. Did it all spiral out of control. The not being able to read until he picked up Beowulf and other things maybe all when movie possibly optioned? Filmic qualities.

I've just reread the first couple of chapters of TSP and she says that they kept the Welsh farmhouse address for all such correspondence but arranged for mail to be forwarded to TW's brother.

Yes, you’re right. I don’t know how it works in terms of providing an address for benefits purposes. Just speculating, but maybe they had an agreement with a friend (e.g. with Polly or Jan) that they’d use one of their addresses?

But they forgot to take the medicine with them so they/he decided to go through withdrawal.

Ah thanks - sorry, just cross-posted with you. Isn’t that fraud though to give the address of somewhere you’re no longer living and don’t own anymore? If they had a friend’s address with that friend’s agreement, surely that would’ve been better?

Chapter 12 in TWS says:

We still travelled north to see the same consultant, a journey every six months that led us back to Wales, a tie not quite severed.

They don't seem to see them every six months though do they, more like once every few years

Ah, but this is Mrs Sally Walker's description of what happened, isn't it.

If the Consultant had just delivered a terminal diagnosis, this would be shocking.

But, if he had said, for example, "Your latest tests don't show anything that could be causing this. We'll keep an eye on it and if you get significantly worse come straight back. Meanwhile, don't get over tired and take it slowly on uneven ground and stairs"....

@SuffolkSun
If you want them to know, surely you would do that...
But is there a way in 2025 to hide a prior diagnosis or change of diagnosis? Is all paperwork online or just the newest stuff with older things sitting in some archive?

RW was down for I think two Arvon residential courses on nature writing over the next few months. Now replaced by someone else, obviously.

@HatStickBoots That is very well-written, thank you. I was always sceptical about this 'phenomenon' and was quite disturbed at the appropriation of the SWCP for this brand.

However, I wanted to understand what it was that readers connected with - so I was attracted to this particular thread because it was called: To feel disappointed ....

@Catwith69lives

What is the reference for the final court case being June 2013?

Or anyone who knows...

Or if they just gave the brother's address as their contact, but to use a, presumably empty, repossessed house seems, um, unusual.

@Hyenana By "online", I meant computerised so easy to send to someone quickly, on request.

Within a hospital trust and associated health district (certainly the one I'm in) all test results, x-rays, letters etc are on the hospital system so that a Clinician, or GP, can look them up on the spot if needed during a consultation. But I don't think they'd be available elsewhere in the country, unless requested by another hospital? So yes, if you rock up somewhere and forget to mention you've been under treatment elsewhere, any prior diagnosis wouldn't necessarily come to light.

I don't think you should be ashamed at feeling duped. Huge numbers of readers feel the same way, as evidenced by the furore following the Observer revelations.

As a reader you have every reason to believe that a highly reputable publishing house (PRH) that markets TSP as an "unflinchingly honest account" of a redemptive struggle against adversity and then festoons the paperback version with every sort of hagiographical newspaper review is something trustworthy and credible rather than snake oil.

In much the same way when you buy a bottle of Coke you have every reason to believe that you aren't about to drink a bottle of anti-freeze!

@Hyenana Should have said "all test results, letters etc for a diagnosed condition under treatment" which I have. I don't know about routine GP appointments or visits to A&E.

another problem with IT systems in the NHS is that those commonly used in GP surgeries and in hospitals are often incompatible. So GPs and hospital doctors can't read each other's notes on the same patient.

(When I was working the one exception to this was the system which recorded results of tests, which could be accessed by all the different IT systems).

I don't know how compatible the IT systems are between different hospital trusts, or between England and Wales.

Yes, NHS IT is a pig!

That withdrawal thing is so weird - can’t imagine it’s pleasant 😬 And the idea of just taking the medicine when you feel like it… because that works just fine for most other patients of serious illnesses. But… let’s not forget it’s the walk that really cured him, rather than the medicine!

I’m beginning to think more and more that his CBD is a big fat untruth built on a grain of truth, like the other things the Observer have covered, because you obviously can’t just stop taking medicine for a chronic condition and be fine, especially whilst doing a gruelling walk and not eating very much.

This is massive speculation, and please stop me if I’m straying too far from the path, but I’m beginning to wonder if he was mentally unwell when they did the walk and in the period leading up to it. It wouldn’t be surprising considering they’d lost their home and he’d been having unexplained physical symptoms) but soon realised that walking in the fresh air with his wife was actually very restorative and felt all the better for it. That would explain why he’d told JI about his suicidal thoughts.

Yes, I’m being glib and presumptuous, but there’s definitely a possibility there. But then maybe he feels shame for feeling all of this, and for what got them into the situation they’re in, so they decide to investigate his physical symptoms and fabricate them quite a lot. They’re so bold to have told ‘Bill’ that he only had a couple of months to live, when it’s not even certain he had CBD.