WENDIGO

The Wendigo is a creature/beast that consumes human flesh and terrorizes everyone. But, of course, we don't know if it's a real creature or just some legend.

There is also a sickness called the wendigo psychosis.

Wendigo Psychosis is one of the more dramatic mental illnesses. It is characterized by a deep craving for human flesh as food. It's also — possibly — entirely made up. Judge for yourself.

Even if you think the sickness is made up, think again — there are quite a number of scary cases involving this unknown sickness.

One of the famous cases of wendigo psychosis reported involved a Plains Cree trapper from Alberta, named Swift Runner.



 During the winter of 1878, Swift Runner and his family were starving, and his eldest son died.

Twenty-five miles away from emergency food supplies (*1) at a Hudson's Bay Company post, Swift Runner butchered and ate his wife and five remaining children.

Given that he resorted to cannibalism so near to food supplies, and that he killed and consumed the remains of all those present, it was revealed that Swift Runner's was not a case of pure cannibalism as a last resort to avoid starvation, but rather of a man suffering from wendigo psychosis. He eventually confessed and was executed by authorities at Fort Saskatchewan.

(*1) If he wanted food, he could have just walked to Hudson's Bay Company for the emergency food supplies — it's only 25 miles! This is one of the evidence saying he has the wnedigo sickness.

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