MBA Trustee Juls Stodel shares her own tale of rescue in the hopes it’ll ease the stigma felt by a walker cragfast in shame a year after calling on Mountain Rescue in TGO’s advice column, supported by Highlander Outdoor. Every month, one reader who writes to Juls with an Uphill Struggle will win an £100 voucher to spend with Highlander.
Dear Juls,
I had to call Mountain Rescue last year and I’ve had a difficult time confronting the (self-inflicted) stigma. Even though we were reassured by the rescue team that we were prepared for conditions that changed unexpectedly, against our favour, I still feel trauma hanging about. How do I start gaining my confidence back and talking about the experience without feeling shame?Ana, April 2026
Dear Ana,
I called Mountain Rescue after misjudging the force of a swollen burn. I was slammed off my feet, dragged under, smacked onto rocks. I eventually managed to grab a bank and haul myself up only to find myself on a section of useless grass cut off from anywhere else by the vicious spate. The sheer level of abrasion from the water had pierced through the dry bags in my backpack, soaking my sleeping bag and clothes. I realised my choices were to either sit it out, soaked and exposed, in this hellish weather in the hope it would abate and the water drop before the cold consumed me so I could safely cross. Or call Mountain Rescue.
Arrochar MRT never once made me feel stupid. Two days later I went to a campsite to wait for a delivery replacing equipment that had not survived the encounter. By then bruises had shown up everywhere from my feet to my face. I explained the situation to the woman checking me in.
“Don’t you know how much a rescue costs?”
Yes, I knew how much a rescue cost. I also, to this day, still have no idea how else I would have healthily remedied the situation on my own. I suppose she would have just preferred I died – and that says more about her than me.
Many of the people that so loudly and virtuously shame anyone that requires rescue have just been lucky enough to never need it. Some will boast about dragging themselves out five miles with a broken leg – no MRT volunteer I know who hears those stories is impressed. It isn’t big nor clever to risk giving yourself a lifetime of problems in order to not ‘waste resources’ that exist for just this situation.
Yes, occasionally we hear outlandish tales. The young hikers dressed in jogging bottoms and trainers up Ben Macdui, trapping themselves in -15C conditions recently comes to mind. Those lads will be forever haunted by that ordeal, all the while reading comments pillorying them online. Don’t think for one second that they will ever be so unprepared again – I certainly overthink water crossings now, and I expect you also now act with greater caution. Probably much more than necessary.
Your confidence may be struggling, but your wisdom is now far greater. The only message you need to pay attention to is the reassurance your rescuers gave you. Mountains will humble us all, and no hillwalker should have an ego; that includes those that do not believe they could ever possibly need rescue.
The best thing we can do with our experiences is to own them. To use them both to educate others to avoid the mistakes we made, and to cut through the virtue signalling to the people that need to hear that it’s not a crime to need help.
Thank you, Ana, for beginning to share your story.
Every month, one reader who writes to Juls with an Uphill Struggle will win an £100 voucher to spend with Highlander Outdoor.
