Recently, two spectacular stories of suffering and great escape have been in the news, one much more courageous than the other.

The first is about Darlene Heatherington, who will appear in court in Great Falls, Montana on Tuesday. Earlier this month, the Lethbridge, Alberta politician was found distraught in the parking lot of the Treasure Island Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. She had gone to Great Falls, Montana with some municipal colleagues and disappeared.

Her initial story was that she had been drugged and kidnapped from outside the Great Falls Civic Centre, taken to Las Vegas and sexually assaulted. She later revised her account, saying that she had embarked on a road trip to California with a man named Darrell.

In the Great Falls Tribune, officials said it was important to clear the air about the safety of Great Falls. The paper published details about her last known movements, tracked by electronic key cards and credit cards. She shopped at Dragonfly Dry Goods, the westside Albertsons and visited Bev’s Cup O’ Joe Espresso, where she ordered a cup of coffee. At Wal-Mart, employees provided police with examples of the clothing that she had purchased.And then it got murky, and finally her husband flew to the US and picked her up.

The other great escape was made by Aron Ralston. In a real-life episode of Survivor that was much more amazing than anything dreamed up by a television producer, he was stuck for three days with his arm pinned beneath a boulder in a Utah canyon. Realizing he was going to die, he amputated his own arm to get free.

The details of the procedure, which Ralston gave cheerfully in a press conference (after he was found by Dutch tourists, fed Oreo cookies and taken to hospital for surgery) are grisly and as unbelievable as Heatherington’s story. He first broke the two bones of his forearm by “applying torque in just the right direction” and then sawed through the rest with a cheap knife, rappelled 18 metres down a cliff and hiked 10 kilometres.

Ralston’s courage, to do what he had to do in order to survive, is amazing. Superhuman.

It looks like Darlene Heatherington’s misadventure came about because she was just looking for trouble or distraction or love, and she lied about it and lied again and everybody caught her with her lies.

There is no doubt that Ralston is an unusual man. He is going to be picked first for Red Rover for the rest of his life.

Darlene Heatherington is going to be picked last for a long time, but it’s not quite fair to dismiss her dithered wandering as just the bad planning on the part of a panicked wife about to get caught cheating.

In a way, Heatherington gnawed her own arm off to get away from something. She has been charged with only a misdemeanor, providing a false report to police, so she can continue to sit on Lethbridge city council. But, she has already been sent letters suggesting that she reconsider.

The Great Falls prosecutor has offered to dismiss the charge if she receives psychiatric help, stays out of trouble for one year and pays court costs ranging from $100 to $500. Taking the deal will shorten people’s memory: no jail time, an acceptance of professional help. We will forget Heatherington, at least until they make a movie-of-the-week.

But whatever is wrong with her family life, between Heatherington and her husband and three children, will not get fixed overnight. Whatever possessed her to do such a thing came from someplace deep inside. Women run away from their lives all the time, and many more want to. Actors Margot Kiddder and Anne Heche were each once found broken down, disheveled and wandering. People suffer in myriad ways not as immediately visible or visceral as an arm pinned under a boulder.