Reconnecting and Rejuvenating at the Great Bear Gathering

by David Stalling

Every now and then, depression hits me like a tsunami. It feels like drowning.

I’ll lie in bed for days, barely getting up. I don’t eat. I sleep around the clock. Friends will sometimes take my beautiful dog, Pika, for a while, because I can’t properly care for her when I’m in that state.

I don’t want to be around anyone. Truthfully, not many people would want to be around me then anyway, so I’ve learned to just go with it — to wait it out, to sleep it out — knowing that eventually I’ll pull myself back out of the darkness.

And sometimes, strangely enough, good things come from it.

I was thinking about that the other day, angry that another bout of depression had arrived right when the annual Great Bear Gathering was happening — an event I look forward to every year and had been genuinely excited about. But depression has a way of destroying excitement. It steals motivation. It takes away the very things you normally love.

The Great Bear Gathering is an annual gathering of people who understand grizzly bears, who care about them, and who fight to protect them. Scientists, activists, lawyers, writers, and ordinary citizens who have learned to respect and love the great bear as much as I have. Many of them are close friends of mine, and being around them can be refreshing, healing, and rejuvenating.

This year’s theme was “Reconnect and Rejuvenate.”

At first, I was going to skip it. I was in no mood to be around anybody. But then I started thinking about something important: if it weren’t for some of my mental health struggles, I would never have come to know and understand grizzlies at all. I doubt I’d even still be alive. Grizzlies saved my life.

It was years ago, not long after leaving a Marine Corps Force Recon unit where I had earned the rank of Sergeant, that I found myself spiraling toward the edge of suicide. I was also denying, suppressing and hiding my attraction to men. It was a lot to deal with. I hated myself. I spent a lot of time alone in very remote, wild places. Out there I could feel safe and more comfortable with myself. Because out there, there are no societal-created pressures and expectations. Everything is what it is.

Around that same time, I had my first encounters with wild grizzlies, including a bluff charge. It was the first time in my life I had ever truly been humbled.

I became fascinated — completely captivated — by these powerful, intelligent, beautiful wild animals. I studied them. I spent time around them. I learned their behavior, their warnings, their body language, and their true nature. And I learned something most people do not understand: Grizzlies are not nearly as dangerous as many people believe. Ironically, I often feel safer around grizzlies than I do around people. I trust them. In many ways, I relate to them.

(See “How Grizzlies Made me Gay”)

Recently, I met a man who had just moved to Montana from Pennsylvania. He was a mechanic. Within minutes, he was explaining to me how wrong I was about grizzly bears — how dangerous they are and what a fool I must be. I hear that a lot. People cling tightly to myths, especially the ones they grew up believing.

I asked him how he had become such an expert on grizzlies while living in Pennsylvania. I told him I would never be arrogant enough to explain auto repair to a mechanic, so how was it that he somehow knew more about grizzlies than someone who had spent four decades studying, tracking, writing about and living around them? I explained to him that if you give grizzlies space and show them respect, the danger is greatly reduced.

Of course, he immediately brought up Timothy Treadwell, the man featured in the documentary Grizzly Man, who was killed and eaten by a grizzly in Alaska along with his girlfriend. I hear that a lot too.

But Timothy Treadwell did not respect grizzlies. Crawling close to them, talking to them like babies, calling them cute little names — that is not respect. Respect is understanding what they are. Respect is learning their behavior, recognizing their boundaries, and giving them the space they need and deserve. They are grizzly bears. They have earned and deserve our utmost respect.

All of this was running through my mind and more as the gathering approached.

One of my roles at the Great Bear Gathering is leading a campfire discussion where I read stories and poems that try to convey the true nature of grizzlies. I also invite others to share their own stories and memories, including tributes to people who dedicated their lives to protecting bears and increasing public understanding about them.

So eventually, I got myself out of bed and drove north to the University of Montana’s Lubrecht Experimental Forest for the gathering.

That night, I spoke openly about my mental health struggles. I explained what I had been going through and why simply showing up had been difficult for me. And they understood. They understood because they know me, and because many of them carry struggles of their own. They supported me without judgment.

I read the following poems and essays: “Warning: A Lesson in Humility and Respect,” “Fear of Fur and Claw,” “A Love Letter to the Great Bear,” “Drinking Beer with a Bear,” and “Grizzlies Deserve our Humility and Respect.”

During my reading, I talked about how my mental health struggles helped lead me to grizzlies — and how grizzlies, in their own way, helped save me. Not just the bears themselves, but also the people who love them enough to fight for them. People who understand wildness. People who understand solitude. People who understand survival. People who understand and appreciate honesty.

People at the Great Bear Gathering,

Those people helped save me too. And for that, I am deeply grateful. I am grateful that I went. I am grateful that I came to know grizzlies. And I am grateful to know the people who dedicate their lives to protecting them.

To wild grizzlies, and the people who strive to understand and protect wild grizzlies, thank you!