Carter Armstrong touching lives with his mental health run across Canada
June 15, 2026, 2:06 pm
Kara Kinna
Only months ago, Carter Armstrong tried to take his own life, and lost a friend to suicide. Today he’s thousands of miles from where he was before—both literally and figuratively. Carter is running across Canada for mental health, raising money for the Canadian Mental Health Association and raising awareness along the way about the importance of mental health, and about reaching out for help.
Carter was in Moosomin on June 6 after being escorted by the Whitewood, Wapella, and Moosomin Fire Departments through the area.
He hopes to raise at least $100,000 on his run from Vancouver to Dryden, Ontario, and hopes to extend his trip to the East Coast if he can find a sponsor for the rest of the journey.
“I lost a buddy two years ago to mental health. He committed suicide two years ago. And I actually attempted suicide about four months ago,” Carter told the World-Spectator on the day he made it to Moosomin.
“My friend was one of the funniest guys you’d ever meet, and it was unfortunate because it came as a shock because he just didn’t talk about that kind of thing. I knew he was wasn’t doing the best, but I never thought that he would kill himself. So that one was hard.
“I think that’s a big thing, just not speaking up, people saying ‘I’m not asking for help.’ That’s a big thing I’m pushing right now, is getting the message out that it’s okay to need help, it’s okay to not be okay. You’re not weak, it’s stronger to get help. You need to actually acknowledge that rather than just push it down and push it down and push it down, and then leave everybody else in a mess.
“I decided I was doing this run the day after I attempted suicide, so it was just a spur of the moment thing. The next day I went for a run, it was like minus 20 outside, and I decided that I wanted to help somebody in the same position that I was in, and also to show myself what I can accomplish.
“So I booked my flights to Vancouver and started running about a month and a half after I decided.”
Getting started
“I was always an athlete, but I wasn’t a runner, so it was a shock to the body for the first little while, and I have a backpack, which has my tent and all my gear. I was running with my pack every day because I didn’t have a vehicle following me, but now it has become a lot easier. People take my pack from one place to the next for me, or people like my escorts today—the Moosomin and Wapella Fire Departments. Stuff like that makes a big difference,” says Carter.
“I have some great supporters that just reach out to me or other people and let them know. Or I meet someone in a town, and they know someone in the next town—it’s just kind of word of mouth and it spreads like that, kind of like the ultimate Canadian way to do it.
“I rely on the kindness of strangers, and it has really restored my faith in Canada and just humanity. It has been pretty cool.
“I was probably running about 80 kilometers a week when I started training, which now I do in less than a day and a half, and then I was doing runs with a weighted vest to try to simulate the backpack.
“When I told my parents, it was funny, because they just kind of laughed at it, and then I told them two weeks later that I had booked my flights to Vancouver. So I just kind of jumped into it and figured it out. There have been a lot of ups and downs, for sure.”
The motivation
What is Carter’s the main motivation for the run?
“What really gets me going is people texting me and saying they got up and moved today because of me, or they’re inspired,” he says. “That goes way past money for me. Or just guys reaching out and saying, ‘you know, seeing you do this, we realize it’s not weak to be struggling,’ and so they reached out and got help.
“The big thing is just raising awareness. It’s for me too. I’ve learned so much on this journey about myself, about others. I’ve learned that I’m never alone, because even though I’m doing this unsupported, I’ve always had so much support.
“You can do anything you set your mind to. I wasn’t a runner, and now I’m running solo 50 kilometers a day. You can push past so much. When you think you’re done, you’re not, you have so much more. And I’ve learned there’s great humans, and that you’re never alone. That’s probably one of the biggest things I have learned. Random strangers will take you in, they’ll hear your story, and there’s still kindness in the world.”
The most important lesson
Carter says the most important thing he’s learned on his cross-Canada run is that things can really change.
“I learned that I never need to be in that position that I was in, and that I’m really proud of myself for changing lives, and I have kind of found my purpose. I just want to continue to inspire others. I feel like that’s what my purpose is.”
What is his advice to others who are facing mental health challenges?
“Find something that you love to do. It doesn’t matter how much money you make. I’ve been on the road and I’ve ran out of water, not knowing where I was sleeping, not knowing what I was eating, and when you break it down in the simplest parts of life, we take everything so much for granted, and we have so much. If you actually just look, we have so much. And everyone does it, everyone gets caught up in the little things in life, and there’s so much to be grateful for, and there’s so much to live for, and everyone matters so much.
“Hard times pass. It’s hard to see when you’re in them, because I get it, I know it, but just like anything, everything passes—the good, the bad. Don’t hold on to anything, because it all goes and comes and goes.”
Changed forever
Even though he’s part way through his run, Carter says he knows he will be changed forever from the experience.
“In every way, yes. I’m more grateful for life, and just knowing you’ve done something for somebody else always makes a difference. It fills my soul to be able to help,” he says.
“I ran with a girl that was 14 the other day, and she has really struggled with her mental health, and she made a post afterwards, and she got me to write a quote. She used to be a runner, she fell out of it, and she got me to write a quote, and she said ‘I’m going to tattoo this when I can,’ and she’s like, ‘You’ve changed my outlook on life.’
“That kind of thing is beautiful, because I could have saved that girl’s life—you never know, right? It’s a pretty good feeling. As hard as running is, as hard as the challenges are, it’s so fulfilling, and it’s so rewarding. It’s pretty special.”
The challenges
Carter says there have been challenges to running every day all day, and he had to push through them.
“At the start of the day, sometimes when you wake up and you can barely walk, and you’re like, ‘am I gonna run another 50?’ or when I was tenting, there were a couple times at the start that were tough,” he says.
“Day three was really the hardest day for me. I did 60 kilometers with my bag the first day—60 kilometers with 50 pounds on your back when you’re not trained. And then day two I did 45 kilometers, and on day three I did 35, but the last five kilometers I limped and it took me like 40 minutes a kilometer, which is barely moving. My body was just shutting down. I wasn’t eating enough, wasn’t drinking enough water, I had lactic acid in my body shutting my muscles down, saying enough’s enough.
“I called my mom. I was on the side of the road, and I was like, ‘what am I doing? I can’t do this.’
“So I took a rest day, and then re-evaluated.
“There have been a lot of times that have tested me. One day when I ran out of water, it was 28 degrees out, and I was in B.C. in the desert, and I was debating just setting up my tent and passing out because my brain wasn’t functioning.
“I found this pond that was so gross. I knew I had 10 kilometers to the next gas station, so I took off my shoes and I bushwhacked into this pond as I was filling my water. I had purification tablets, and I saw two geese just looking at me, and they’re in the pond.
“I knew the water was going to taste terrible. So I threw a bunch of electrolyte packets and other stuff into it, trying to change the flavor. I’ve never been so grateful for water that tastes like that—that tasted like goose crap. It was terrible, but I had water.
“When you break it down to the basics of life, I’ve been living out of a backpack for two months now and I’ve never been happier because of all the genuine people I’ve met and the souls I’ve touched. When you break down, you really don’t need all the fancy things.”
How to donate
Carter is collecting donations for the Mental Health Association through GoFundMe.
Anyone looking to support Carter’s fundraiser can find the GoFundMe page here: https://gofund.me/08fd7f10f
