February 10, 2025 • 35 mins
Her monster kidnappers took nine months of her life, but Elizabeth Smart refused to let her nightmare as a young girl define her as a woman. In this episode of Let's Be Clear, she shares what she wished someone had taught her before she was taken from her bedroom as a child.Plus, her advice to parents on what to teach their kids about sexual violence. This is how to turn trauma into triumph.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Let's Be Clear with Shannon Doorny. Hello, Let's
be clear family. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and I'm so excited
and honored to be guest hosting today. I know, Let's
Be Clear is all about strong women using their voices
about issues that they care about, things that are important
(00:23):
to them, and so I'm just very, very honored to
be included in that number. Over the past twenty years,
I have just come to really realize and recognize that
every person has a story and that we are so
all interconnected, and that are what we experience can have
(00:47):
not just a huge impact on our own lives, but
on the lives all around us. And we will probably
never ever realize the impact that each one of our
stories has on those around us. You know, I have
spent the last twenty plus years in the advocacy world
in speaking out, in sharing my story of abduction and
(01:09):
captivity and then my rescue and moving forward, and I've
had so many people approach me over the years and
say things like I've experienced something similar, but nothing in comparison.
And when I hear those words, I am actually heartbroken,
(01:30):
because we shouldn't be comparing ourselves to anyone No one
should be looking at my experience and then looking at
their experience and being like, well, why does she seem okay?
Why when what I went through doesn't seem to be
like on the same level of what she went through,
And yet I'm not okay. That is so unfair and
(01:52):
so wrong. And if we ever cross paths and you
say that to me, we're not going to be friends,
because that is not okay. At the end of the day,
paying is pain, and trauma is trauma, and we are
all so different. There's no way you could ever accurately
compare your trauma, your story, or your experiences to anyone else's.
(02:13):
So I just wanted to start by saying, give yourself
some grace, give yourself some love and compassion, and just
acknowledge that we are we are all different, none of
us are the same. You know, I was raised in
a very safe, secure, loving family. I never dreamed that
(02:35):
anything bad could ever happen to me. I thought that
my life would just continue on the way that it
had been going. You know, I thought I'd go to
I was in junior high at the time. If I
was going to finish junior high, i'd go to high school.
I'd go to college, you know, I'd get a job,
I'd fall in love, I'd get married, I'd have a family,
(02:55):
and that would pretty much more or less be my life.
Like that is how I saw going. And prior to
my kidnapping, I could not imagine my life like anything
altering that that path forward. It just that just seemed
like what it would be. And of course it was
the night before I was about to graduate when my
(03:16):
world literally flipped upside down. I shared a room with
my younger sister, Mary Catherine, and we were about five
years apart, so I was fourteen, she was she was nine, sighing,
and I remember going to bed that night. I remember
reading a book to her, and she kept on asking
(03:37):
me like, oh, read one more chapter, Read one more chapter.
And I remember by the time I actually finished reading
just one more chapter, she had actually fallen asleep, and
I remember it being pretty late, and I remember just
putting the book down and lying in bed next her
and falling asleep. The next thing that I remember was
a man standing over me. He had a knife at
(03:59):
my neck and he was saying, well, he was telling me,
I have a knife at your neck, don't make sound.
Get up and come with me. And I mean initially
I didn't think that that there could actually be a
man in my room. That just was not something that
was a possibility. There's no way that could happen. My
bedroom was on the top floor of our house. It
(04:19):
was probably one of the highest, one of the highest,
if not the highest point of the house. I mean,
none of my windows were on ground floor. And I
think that had been very intentional by my parents when
they were like designing our house and deciding where each
one of us should sleep. So this was just not
something that I ever thought could happen. Plus, in that moment,
(04:41):
I was totally shocked. Like I received probably the same
safety education that everybody else receives, like look both ways
when you cross the street, stranger danger, use the buddy system.
If you catch on fire, you should you stop drop
and roll. And like if we were all sitting in
a room together, I'd probably ask you, oh, how many
(05:04):
of you have ever actually used stop, drop and roll?
In all my time like speaking and advocating, And I've
asked that question. It's been so few. Hardly anyone raises
their hand. If it's a really big audience, maybe there's
one person, maybe one person that's it. But statistically now
(05:24):
I know that on average in the United States, one
out of five women is sexually abused. In my home
state of Utah, it's about one in three. It varies
from state to state, and I am willing to bet
that those statistics aren't accurate because not every woman discloses,
not every person discloses, and so I don't mean to
(05:45):
go down a rabbit hole, but sometimes I just think,
why are we teaching stop, drop and roll, which again
I'm pro safety education, like we should, yes, absolutely teach
everything we can to prevent things from happening, But at
the same time, the chances of you actually using that
seemed to be, in my experience, very very slim, whereas
(06:06):
the chances of you experiencing some form of sexual violence
or abuse are very high. Anyway, that's always kind of
bothered me. But in that moment, when this man standing
above me with a knife to my neck saying get
up and come with me, I really genuinely did not
feel like I had any other option. There was no
education that I had been given up to that point
(06:29):
that really made me feel like I could do something different.
So I remember just immediately getting up and going with him.
I didn't know who he was, I didn't know what
he was capable of, but he did have a knife
on me. He was telling me to go with him,
and I felt like I needed to do everything I
(06:49):
could to survive. I felt like I needed to do
everything I could to protect my little sister, who was
asleep in bed next me. And I got up and
I went with him, and I remember he took me
up into the mountains behind my home. The whole way
as he took me up into the mountains, I remember
just being so worried and nervous that maybe there was
(07:10):
a chance to escape, Maybe there was an opportunity to escape.
And I remember being so worried and concerned that somehow
I had missed that opportunity, that somehow that opportunity had
passed me by and I'd missed my chance. I remember
being absolutely terrified that somehow I'd missed my chance. Of course,
(07:30):
now like looking back on that night and thinking back
on that night, I can honestly say that no, there
was never a chance for me to escape. But you know,
as a fourteen year old like that was those were
their thoughts going through my head. I remember it felt
like we went on all night. Right as we crossed
(07:53):
the top of the mountain, the sun it was light,
the sun was up, and he was in a rush
to get me down the other side, and I remember
we we were probably we were probably about a quarter
of the way down the other side of the mountain
when we came to a stand of trees, which, again
not that strange. I mean, we had fought our way
(08:13):
through trees the whole way up the mountain. It stood
to reason they'd be trees on the other side. So
when we were about a quarter of the way down,
he brought me to the stand of trees and they
all looked the same to me. I honestly don't know
how he knew that it was this specific stand of trees,
but he brought me into the middle and I saw
how part of the mountain side had been leveled out.
(08:35):
There was a tent set up outside, there were some
tarps laying on the ground, and there were some tarps
hanging up in the trees, and there was a woman.
And my first impression when I saw this woman was
that it was going to be okay. Because this woman,
I mean, she was older. I remember, she kind of
(08:57):
opened her arms to me as she approached me, like
she was gonna hug me, and I just remember thinking, well,
if there's there's a woman here, then truly nothing that
terrible can happen, Like she will protect me if anything
bad is going to happen. Unfortunately, that thought disappeared pretty
(09:18):
quickly because when she hugged me, it wasn't really like
a comforting embrace. It was really more sort of a
it was it was more sort of an embrace that
seemed to exert dominance, if that makes sense. It was
like she wanted me to know that she was in
control and not me. And I remember she brought me
(09:40):
inside of the tent. She sat me down on this
upturned bucket. She started to try to undress me. I
was very shy as a fourteen year old. I was
very self conscious as a fourteen year old. I mean
getting changed for gym class was traumatic to me. Back then.
It was like I'd like lay my shore out and
I'd lay my t shirt out so I could make
(10:02):
the smoothest quickest transition possible from like the rest of
the day close to the gym clothes and then vice versa.
When when gym class was over, so I was. I was.
It'd be fair to say I was pretty awkward as
a kid, and I was anyway. I wasn't okay with
her trying to dress me or sponge bathe me. And
(10:26):
I remember begging her and pleading with her to let
me do it, which she actually did, which I didn't
know at that point, but now, of course, in hindsight,
I know that was actually a very big deal. This woman,
she never she never changed her mind. Like once she
made up her mind on something, that was it, that
was the only way forward. And once I had done
(10:49):
what she said, she scooped up my clothes and she
got up and walked out of the tent. And then
in came this man and he came in and he
knelt down next to me, and honestly, I wasn't listening
(11:12):
to what he had to say. I was like, I
was crying. I was scared. I was wondering, how had
this happened to me? Why was this happening to me?
Like I didn't think we had offended anyone, and certainly
we hadn't offended anyone enough that they would choose to
(11:34):
kidnap me to like as some form of revenge. Why
would anyone kidnap me like I wasn't anything special. I
couldn't understand it. And I remember himkneeling down next to
me and he started to speak, and initially I really
wasn't paying attention to what he was saying, but then
I had a thought that maybe I should, because maybe
(11:54):
there'd be some clue or some hint or something that
would let me know why he had kidnapped me, give
me some direction of how to get away, or maybe
get a message to my family, which is when I
heard him say that I was now his wife, and
I remember just being so shocked when he first started speaking.
(12:22):
I really didn't know what he was going to say.
I think if I expected him to say anything, it
probably would have been like an explanation, or maybe like
a ransom demand, or what their plan or intention was
with me. It wasn't that we were now going to
be husband and wife. And I remember just begging and
(12:44):
pleading with him that this couldn't happen. This wasn't okay.
I was still a kid, I wasn't eighteen, like, this
wasn't legal. All these reasons why this wasn't okay, and
ultimately none of it nothing that I said made a difference.
He ultimately did force me on the ground and rape me.
(13:05):
When he was finished, he stood up and smiled and
turned around and walked away out of the tent. Now
for me, that was devastating. I mean, I grew up
in a very conservative home. I grew up in a
very Christian home. I went to church every single Sunday.
There'd always been a huge emphasis put on chastity, on purity,
(13:27):
on virtue. Basically all these different words. You could use,
all these different words almost interchangeably, because they all seemed
to mean don't have sex before marriage, and nobody ever
took the time, which I think is so so important.
If I'm not here to say, like what you should
(13:48):
teach your child like, or when you should teach your
child about sex or intimacy like, everyone should use their
own discretion. But I do feel very strongly that when
you do decide to teach your children, when you do
decide to have these conversations with them, it is vital
(14:09):
that you speak to them and help them understand that
there is a difference between you know, enthusiastic consensual sex,
consensual intimacy versus rape and sexual violence, and that it
can happen. I've met I've just met so many survivors
(14:31):
over the years that didn't know what happened to them
was rape because it was from someone that they knew,
a partner or a friend or a family member, and
they think, well, you know, that can't happen because I
know this person, or this is my uncle, they love me,
my family loves him, or my family would never believe
(14:54):
me over him. That just I think it's really important
that we have these conversations because it can be anyone.
And I'm not saying it's necessarily always going to be
a man. Statistically the chances are much greater. But if
you're going to have these, when you have conversations like this,
please do yourself and your child of favor and talk
(15:17):
to them as well about sexual violence and rape, because
otherwise it can lead to so much guilt and so
much shame and feeling like you're not worthy, you're not
good enough, you're not lovable, because that's exactly what happened
to me after my kidnapper raped me. I really doubted
(15:39):
whether or not I was good enough to be saved.
I doubted whether or not I was worthy to be saved.
I felt like if my parents knew what had happened
to me, that they would just say, oh, you know,
like this, that's too bad, But we still have five
other kids, and that's still a lot of kids, so
we'll we'll just have to write Elizabeth. Of course that
(16:00):
is not what they felt or thought, but having grown
up with that kind of mindset, never having had the
education on the differences, I didn't know that, and that's
just how I felt. I remember at that point. I
actually don't know if I fell asleep or if I
(16:22):
passed out, but one of the two happened. And when
I woke up, there was a piece of metal cable
and it was wrapped around my ankle and there were
bolts crushed into place so that I couldn't run away.
It was just long enough for me to lie down
inside the tent that they had set up, and then
long enough for me to reach a bucket, and that
(16:44):
was as far as I could move. I mean, it
wasn't a lot. It was maybe twelve feet. I mean
that's maybe as far as I could move. And I
really did feel like I had hit rock bottom in
that moment. And my captors, of course, they were they
were talking and talking about how things were going to go,
(17:10):
kind of what the rules were. They were telling me
I had a new name. They were telling me I
couldn't talk about my family, and they're saying all these
things about the future. And I'm looking around this camp
and I'm realizing, Wow, this is really hidden away, this
is really difficult to get to. This is very well supplied.
They're talking about a future. I mean, they don't plan
on killing me yet, Like they plan on keeping me
(17:32):
for for a while. How long is that? Like, it
doesn't sound like days, it sounds kind of more long term.
What if it's months. What if it's years. What if
it's so long that I actually forget who I am?
And that thought really scared me. Now I don't think
I would have actually forgotten who I was, but I
(17:53):
still had that fear regardless. And so I remember just thinking, Wow,
I'm going to remember everything about my life that I
can prior to them kidnapping, and my parents were top
priority of that list of things to remember. And I
remembered my mom one day, I'd come home from school
upset and she's trying to help me feel better, and
then she said, she said a whole bunch of things,
(18:15):
but one of the main things that she said was, Elizabeth,
you know, I may not always agree with everything that
you do, and I might not always like everyone you
decide to interact with, and I may not like all
the places you decide to go. But I'll always love
you and nothing can ever change that. And as I
(18:36):
sat on this mountain side remembering her telling me that,
I realized that she was right, that she would always
love me. That she but it wouldn't matter to her.
Love for me couldn't be altered because I'd been kidnapped,
or because I'd been raped, or because I'd been chained up.
And honestly, that was probably probably the single most important
(19:05):
thought I had while I was kidnapped, because in that moment,
I realized that I had something that my captors could
not take away. I mean, they'd taken me away from
my family, they'd taken my clothes away, they'd raped me,
they chained me up. I mean, they'd taken away my name,
they'd taken away my freedom. They'd taken away so much
(19:26):
they could they could take away my life if they
wanted to, But they could not take away the fact
that my mom would always love me, and so I
made up my mind that that would be worth surviving
for that if it meant doing whatever I had to do,
if it meant that, I would survive another day, And
(19:48):
so that's how I survived every day after that. I
would whenever my captors put me in a situation that
I didn't want to be in, which, let's face it,
that was every day. But if it was something that
I didn't want to do, or something that maybe I'd
been raised not to do that I'd grown up believing
(20:09):
not to do, I would ask myself, what will happen
to me if I don't do this? And then I'd
ask myself what will happen to me if I do this?
And that's how I would gauge my decisions on what
to do. And eventually it did become more second nature,
and from the outside looking in, it would be understandable
(20:32):
how people wouldn't like, why people wouldn't understand why I
did what they did, or why they would think I
looked like like I was okay with it, or why
I didn't appear to be struggling, because over you know,
the last twenty years, over more than that, I have
(20:54):
been questioned so many times like well, why didn't you
run away, Why didn't you scream? Why didn't you yell?
It was never because I didn't want to, and the
few attempts that I made ended very badly. I was
punished brutally, and so I did get to a point
(21:15):
where it just became second nature to do what they want,
because I had learned that's how to survive. And in
my mind when I thought about escaping, when I thought
about making my bid for freedom, I wanted it to
be a sure thing. I did not want to risk
my life, and not only did I feel like my
life was at risk, but I also felt like my
(21:36):
family's life was at risk because he threatened me every day,
not just with my life, both my family's life as well.
And for nine months I had no reason not to
believe him. I mean, he followed through everything he threatened
me with, so when he did make those threats, those
(21:57):
were very real threats. All the way up to the
day that I was rescued. During my captivity, my captors
would take me to southern California. I had convinced them
to come back to Utah. I felt like that was
my best chance to escape, and I remember police officers
(22:19):
approaching my captors and I, and they started questioning my captors,
and then they started questioning me, and initially I gave
them the answers I had been told to give. Was
I was scared to say anything that I was told
not to say. My captors were still physically standing on
(22:39):
either side of me. I mean, they were both touching me. Like,
I did not feel like I was in a safe environment.
I didn't know these police officers. I really had no
interaction with police officers before. I just felt I didn't
feel safe. I didn't feel comfortable and the officers, I mean,
(23:01):
I know they were doing their job, but at the
same time, like they were very aggressive in their questioning
and I was a shy, scared girl, and so ultimately
I was not able to admit who I was until
they had separated me from my captors and questioned me alone.
(23:22):
When I did admit who I was, they did handcuff
me and put me in the back of the car
and take me to the police station, at which point
I thought, oh, my gosh, I made the wrong choice.
I should not have said anything. They think I'm guilty.
They're going to send me to jail. They did eventually
take the handcuffs off and I was reunited with my dad.
(23:56):
Before he arrived, I was brought to this little, small room,
and I just remember thinking, this is the holding cell.
They're going to check me in, Like I thought, I
was allowed a phone call. If they thought I was innocent,
wouldn't they have taken me straight home? Wouldn't they have
let me call my parents. They must think I'm guilty,
(24:17):
they must think that I've done something wrong. And I
remember the door just bursting open, and that's when my
dad appeared, and I remember he just came running over
to me and he just grabbed me in this huge
hug and he started crying and he kept on saying, Elizabeth,
is it really you? And that was the first time
in nine months that I felt safe. That was when
(24:40):
I knew it was going to be okay, because even
if I was in trouble, my dad was there, and
I knew that he was never going to let another
person hurt me the way that these two monsters had
hurt me the last nine months. I was taken to
the police station, I was saying, to the hospital. I
was a actually brought home, and I remember getting home
(25:04):
and it genuinely felt like I mean, I felt like
I was royalty. I felt like everything that had been
taken away from me had all of a sudden been
given back. There was carpet and running water, and I mean,
most importantly, my family was all there, and I just
remember being so happy that night. That is such a
(25:25):
good memory for me. That night. The next morning, I
was in talking with my mom and I was like
turning around to leave her room, and she called me
back and she said, you know, Elizabeth, what these people
have done to you is terrible. Their aunt were strong
to describe how wicked and evil they are. They've stolen
(25:47):
nine months of your life that you will never get back.
But the best punishment you could ever give them is
to be happy. And initially when she said that advice,
I was kind of like, why are you telling me this?
Like I am happy, I'm at home, Like I was
just rescued, Like my story is done, my story is over.
Except it wasn't. I mean, my story is still being
(26:10):
written today, just as all of our stories are. That
was a chapter, certainly, but I mean there were lots
of hard things that have happened since then. I mean,
going through the court experience was hard. Coming to terms
with like my own feelings was hard. Coming to love
(26:30):
myself again was hard because even though I'd been rescued
in that moment and I was happy in that moment,
I mean that moment did eventually fade, and you know,
I would go to church again, or I would sit
in class again, and comments would be made and I
would feel less. Then I'd feel less than everyone else
(26:53):
or not as good as everyone else. And so that
took time to heal my relationship with myself. And even
though logically I could always be like, yeah, I didn't
choose to be kidnapped, I didn't choose to be raped,
I didn't choose to be heart or broken, I still
felt that way and so that did take time. And
(27:16):
you know, there were many steps in my journey, and
I am often asked, well, you know, what did you
do for your healing, or like, have you tried this
therapy or what do you think of that therapy? And
first and foremost, I am a fan of therapy. When
I was first rescued, I did not understand what it was.
I had a very antiquated idea of what it was,
(27:39):
and it was not something I feel like that was
openly spoken about back then, so I didn't want to
speak about what had happened. I was scared to open
myself up and be vulnerable with other people because I thought,
how could they possibly understand. They weren't there, they didn't
experience that. I don't even know this peron, and I
(28:00):
don't know what they have experienced. And if they have
had nothing like even close to that, why would I
want to share like the worst parts of my life
with them? Why would I even want to talk about that.
I just like, I want to leave that in the
past and I want to move forward now. Of course
I know much better. But I will say there is
no formula. There is no one size fits all. There
(28:24):
is no one modality of therapy that will work for everyone.
And if you've ever been in therapy, if you've ever
experienced it, then you know that you are the one
who has to put the work in. And this is
very much uh like, yes, there is a therapist there,
(28:45):
but like, if you're not willing to do the work,
then really you're just wasting your money. So you have
to find what works for you. And there's so many
different kinds of therapy in today's world. And there's so
many different therapists, Like I can say, if you're struggling,
(29:07):
don't give up, don't be afraid to ask for help.
Keep trying and different therapies. Keep trying, you know, different
healing pathways, positive things in your life until you figure
out what works. Don't give up on yourself because no
matter what has happened to you, what someone else has
done to you, or illness or loss of a job,
(29:31):
like you, you're worthy. Nobody else can take away your
value in this world. You should never give up on yourself.
You should constantly be working on building that positive relationship
with yourself. I mean, like the mental voice that you
hear inside your head, the one that it's so easy
to be like, oh, I'm just going to speak about
(29:51):
myself for a minute. Not that I haven't been doing
that already, but it's so easy for like my brain
to be like Elizabeth, like you should have done better.
I expect more out of you, Like why why didn't
you push harder? Why didn't you dig deep? Or why
weren't you smarter? Why weren't you more prepared? It's so
easy to have that kind of thinking, but I think
(30:12):
it's really important for us to try to flip it
to be like, you are so strong, Elizabeth. You are
so strong, You've survived every day of your life up
until now. You can keep going. You are so strong.
Do not give up like you know, and if today
doesn't work out the way you planned, You're going to
try again tomorrow, and you're going to try again the
next day. You will figure this out. You will find
(30:34):
a way through. Like I think that positive relationship, that
positive self talk, trying to switch your inner voice from
negative to positive, I think is so important and really
really powerful for ourselves. So definitely work on your relationship
with yourself, because you're worth it. I would also say
(30:56):
that there isn't any I know. I know I've already
said that there isn't anything that anyone can do to
you that can lose your value. But I really do
want to stress that everyone deserves to have happiness, Everyone
deserves to be loved everyone, everyone deserves connection. And I
(31:21):
have learned over the past long time that not not
all stories have happy endings, unfortunately, and in many cases
of abuse and violence, most of the time comes from
people that you know. And so initially, when I was
(31:44):
at home, when I first came home. As I said,
I was hesitant to share my story. I was hesitant
to speak out because I didn't think anyone could understand.
But then as years went by, began to meet more
and more survivors, and I began to hear more and
more stories, and I realize actually how common it is.
(32:05):
It's important to share our stories because we're not alone.
There are so many other survivors. Whatever your story is,
there is someone out there who's experiencing the same thing.
Maybe the details are different, maybe the circumstances are different,
but there's someone out there who is experiencing the same thing.
And it's so powerful to know that you're not alone.
(32:29):
When I came home, I did feel very alone, but
now I don't because I know there are so many
other survivors out there. And that's why I share my story,
so that they know that they're not alone, so that
they know that there's someone else out there who's experienced
the same thing and they don't need to be ashamed
or embarrassed. And it also helped me realize how lucky
(32:51):
I am because I was kidnapped by a stranger. I
was raped by a stranger, and as I mentioned, most people.
If they're kidnapped or raped, they typically know they're perpetrators.
And I cannot imagine how difficult it would be to
ever trust again because that level of betrayal is so deep.
(33:13):
I cannot imagine how difficult it would be just to
climb into your own bed at night, because you might
not know who's going to climb into bed next to you.
So to all those survivors out there who are struggling
with past abuse, like you are incredible, You are absolutely amazing,
You are so strong, Do not give up on yourself.
(33:37):
And then finally, I would want you to know that, yes,
it can feel like these chapters of our life define us.
It's so easy for me to go out and feel
like when people come up and talk to me, they're
just looking at me as Elizabeth Smart, the girl that
was kidnapped. And sometimes I think, but that's not all,
(33:59):
that's not all of me, Like I'm so much more
than just that one part of my life. I mean,
now I'm married, and I have kids, and I like running,
and I like reading books, and I don't like doing dishes,
but yet I find myself doing them every day nonetheless.
(34:20):
But I mean, like we are all so much more
than the worst moments of our life. And yes, other
people might look at you that way, but ultimately, I
feel like we define ourselves, and we define ourselves not
so much by what happens to us, but how we
respond and what we do next. We define ourselves through
(34:42):
our actions and our choiceices. And so don't give up
on yourself. I mean, keep believing in yourself, share your story,
love yourself, give yourself some grace, and remember you choose
who you get to be. And so with that being said,
I just want to say thank you again for allowing
me to guest host this this session, this podcast of
(35:05):
Let's Be Clear. Thank you and God bless you. M
M m m
This is Let's Be Clear with Shannon Doorny. Hello, Let's
be clear family. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and I'm so excited
and honored to be guest hosting today. I know, Let's
Be Clear is all about strong women using their voices
about issues that they care about, things that are important
(00:23):
to them, and so I'm just very, very honored to
be included in that number. Over the past twenty years,
I have just come to really realize and recognize that
every person has a story and that we are so
all interconnected, and that are what we experience can have
(00:47):
not just a huge impact on our own lives, but
on the lives all around us. And we will probably
never ever realize the impact that each one of our
stories has on those around us. You know, I have
spent the last twenty plus years in the advocacy world
in speaking out, in sharing my story of abduction and
(01:09):
captivity and then my rescue and moving forward, and I've
had so many people approach me over the years and
say things like I've experienced something similar, but nothing in comparison.
And when I hear those words, I am actually heartbroken,
(01:30):
because we shouldn't be comparing ourselves to anyone No one
should be looking at my experience and then looking at
their experience and being like, well, why does she seem okay?
Why when what I went through doesn't seem to be
like on the same level of what she went through,
And yet I'm not okay. That is so unfair and
(01:52):
so wrong. And if we ever cross paths and you
say that to me, we're not going to be friends,
because that is not okay. At the end of the day,
paying is pain, and trauma is trauma, and we are
all so different. There's no way you could ever accurately
compare your trauma, your story, or your experiences to anyone else's.
(02:13):
So I just wanted to start by saying, give yourself
some grace, give yourself some love and compassion, and just
acknowledge that we are we are all different, none of
us are the same. You know, I was raised in
a very safe, secure, loving family. I never dreamed that
(02:35):
anything bad could ever happen to me. I thought that
my life would just continue on the way that it
had been going. You know, I thought I'd go to
I was in junior high at the time. If I
was going to finish junior high, i'd go to high school.
I'd go to college, you know, I'd get a job,
I'd fall in love, I'd get married, I'd have a family,
(02:55):
and that would pretty much more or less be my life.
Like that is how I saw going. And prior to
my kidnapping, I could not imagine my life like anything
altering that that path forward. It just that just seemed
like what it would be. And of course it was
the night before I was about to graduate when my
(03:16):
world literally flipped upside down. I shared a room with
my younger sister, Mary Catherine, and we were about five
years apart, so I was fourteen, she was she was nine, sighing,
and I remember going to bed that night. I remember
reading a book to her, and she kept on asking
(03:37):
me like, oh, read one more chapter, Read one more chapter.
And I remember by the time I actually finished reading
just one more chapter, she had actually fallen asleep, and
I remember it being pretty late, and I remember just
putting the book down and lying in bed next her
and falling asleep. The next thing that I remember was
a man standing over me. He had a knife at
(03:59):
my neck and he was saying, well, he was telling me,
I have a knife at your neck, don't make sound.
Get up and come with me. And I mean initially
I didn't think that that there could actually be a
man in my room. That just was not something that
was a possibility. There's no way that could happen. My
bedroom was on the top floor of our house. It
(04:19):
was probably one of the highest, one of the highest,
if not the highest point of the house. I mean,
none of my windows were on ground floor. And I
think that had been very intentional by my parents when
they were like designing our house and deciding where each
one of us should sleep. So this was just not
something that I ever thought could happen. Plus, in that moment,
(04:41):
I was totally shocked. Like I received probably the same
safety education that everybody else receives, like look both ways
when you cross the street, stranger danger, use the buddy system.
If you catch on fire, you should you stop drop
and roll. And like if we were all sitting in
a room together, I'd probably ask you, oh, how many
(05:04):
of you have ever actually used stop, drop and roll?
In all my time like speaking and advocating, And I've
asked that question. It's been so few. Hardly anyone raises
their hand. If it's a really big audience, maybe there's
one person, maybe one person that's it. But statistically now
(05:24):
I know that on average in the United States, one
out of five women is sexually abused. In my home
state of Utah, it's about one in three. It varies
from state to state, and I am willing to bet
that those statistics aren't accurate because not every woman discloses,
not every person discloses, and so I don't mean to
(05:45):
go down a rabbit hole, but sometimes I just think,
why are we teaching stop, drop and roll, which again
I'm pro safety education, like we should, yes, absolutely teach
everything we can to prevent things from happening, But at
the same time, the chances of you actually using that
seemed to be, in my experience, very very slim, whereas
(06:06):
the chances of you experiencing some form of sexual violence
or abuse are very high. Anyway, that's always kind of
bothered me. But in that moment, when this man standing
above me with a knife to my neck saying get
up and come with me, I really genuinely did not
feel like I had any other option. There was no
education that I had been given up to that point
(06:29):
that really made me feel like I could do something different.
So I remember just immediately getting up and going with him.
I didn't know who he was, I didn't know what
he was capable of, but he did have a knife
on me. He was telling me to go with him,
and I felt like I needed to do everything I
(06:49):
could to survive. I felt like I needed to do
everything I could to protect my little sister, who was
asleep in bed next me. And I got up and
I went with him, and I remember he took me
up into the mountains behind my home. The whole way
as he took me up into the mountains, I remember
just being so worried and nervous that maybe there was
(07:10):
a chance to escape, Maybe there was an opportunity to escape.
And I remember being so worried and concerned that somehow
I had missed that opportunity, that somehow that opportunity had
passed me by and I'd missed my chance. I remember
being absolutely terrified that somehow I'd missed my chance. Of course,
(07:30):
now like looking back on that night and thinking back
on that night, I can honestly say that no, there
was never a chance for me to escape. But you know,
as a fourteen year old like that was those were
their thoughts going through my head. I remember it felt
like we went on all night. Right as we crossed
(07:53):
the top of the mountain, the sun it was light,
the sun was up, and he was in a rush
to get me down the other side, and I remember
we we were probably we were probably about a quarter
of the way down the other side of the mountain
when we came to a stand of trees, which, again
not that strange. I mean, we had fought our way
(08:13):
through trees the whole way up the mountain. It stood
to reason they'd be trees on the other side. So
when we were about a quarter of the way down,
he brought me to the stand of trees and they
all looked the same to me. I honestly don't know
how he knew that it was this specific stand of trees,
but he brought me into the middle and I saw
how part of the mountain side had been leveled out.
(08:35):
There was a tent set up outside, there were some
tarps laying on the ground, and there were some tarps
hanging up in the trees, and there was a woman.
And my first impression when I saw this woman was
that it was going to be okay. Because this woman,
I mean, she was older. I remember, she kind of
(08:57):
opened her arms to me as she approached me, like
she was gonna hug me, and I just remember thinking, well,
if there's there's a woman here, then truly nothing that
terrible can happen, Like she will protect me if anything
bad is going to happen. Unfortunately, that thought disappeared pretty
(09:18):
quickly because when she hugged me, it wasn't really like
a comforting embrace. It was really more sort of a
it was it was more sort of an embrace that
seemed to exert dominance, if that makes sense. It was
like she wanted me to know that she was in
control and not me. And I remember she brought me
(09:40):
inside of the tent. She sat me down on this
upturned bucket. She started to try to undress me. I
was very shy as a fourteen year old. I was
very self conscious as a fourteen year old. I mean
getting changed for gym class was traumatic to me. Back then.
It was like I'd like lay my shore out and
I'd lay my t shirt out so I could make
(10:02):
the smoothest quickest transition possible from like the rest of
the day close to the gym clothes and then vice versa.
When when gym class was over, so I was. I was.
It'd be fair to say I was pretty awkward as
a kid, and I was anyway. I wasn't okay with
her trying to dress me or sponge bathe me. And
(10:26):
I remember begging her and pleading with her to let
me do it, which she actually did, which I didn't
know at that point, but now, of course, in hindsight,
I know that was actually a very big deal. This woman,
she never she never changed her mind. Like once she
made up her mind on something, that was it, that
was the only way forward. And once I had done
(10:49):
what she said, she scooped up my clothes and she
got up and walked out of the tent. And then
in came this man and he came in and he
knelt down next to me, and honestly, I wasn't listening
(11:12):
to what he had to say. I was like, I
was crying. I was scared. I was wondering, how had
this happened to me? Why was this happening to me?
Like I didn't think we had offended anyone, and certainly
we hadn't offended anyone enough that they would choose to
(11:34):
kidnap me to like as some form of revenge. Why
would anyone kidnap me like I wasn't anything special. I
couldn't understand it. And I remember himkneeling down next to
me and he started to speak, and initially I really
wasn't paying attention to what he was saying, but then
I had a thought that maybe I should, because maybe
(11:54):
there'd be some clue or some hint or something that
would let me know why he had kidnapped me, give
me some direction of how to get away, or maybe
get a message to my family, which is when I
heard him say that I was now his wife, and
I remember just being so shocked when he first started speaking.
(12:22):
I really didn't know what he was going to say.
I think if I expected him to say anything, it
probably would have been like an explanation, or maybe like
a ransom demand, or what their plan or intention was
with me. It wasn't that we were now going to
be husband and wife. And I remember just begging and
(12:44):
pleading with him that this couldn't happen. This wasn't okay.
I was still a kid, I wasn't eighteen, like, this
wasn't legal. All these reasons why this wasn't okay, and
ultimately none of it nothing that I said made a difference.
He ultimately did force me on the ground and rape me.
(13:05):
When he was finished, he stood up and smiled and
turned around and walked away out of the tent. Now
for me, that was devastating. I mean, I grew up
in a very conservative home. I grew up in a
very Christian home. I went to church every single Sunday.
There'd always been a huge emphasis put on chastity, on purity,
(13:27):
on virtue. Basically all these different words. You could use,
all these different words almost interchangeably, because they all seemed
to mean don't have sex before marriage, and nobody ever
took the time, which I think is so so important.
If I'm not here to say, like what you should
(13:48):
teach your child like, or when you should teach your
child about sex or intimacy like, everyone should use their
own discretion. But I do feel very strongly that when
you do decide to teach your children, when you do
decide to have these conversations with them, it is vital
(14:09):
that you speak to them and help them understand that
there is a difference between you know, enthusiastic consensual sex,
consensual intimacy versus rape and sexual violence, and that it
can happen. I've met I've just met so many survivors
(14:31):
over the years that didn't know what happened to them
was rape because it was from someone that they knew,
a partner or a friend or a family member, and
they think, well, you know, that can't happen because I
know this person, or this is my uncle, they love me,
my family loves him, or my family would never believe
(14:54):
me over him. That just I think it's really important
that we have these conversations because it can be anyone.
And I'm not saying it's necessarily always going to be
a man. Statistically the chances are much greater. But if
you're going to have these, when you have conversations like this,
please do yourself and your child of favor and talk
(15:17):
to them as well about sexual violence and rape, because
otherwise it can lead to so much guilt and so
much shame and feeling like you're not worthy, you're not
good enough, you're not lovable, because that's exactly what happened
to me after my kidnapper raped me. I really doubted
(15:39):
whether or not I was good enough to be saved.
I doubted whether or not I was worthy to be saved.
I felt like if my parents knew what had happened
to me, that they would just say, oh, you know,
like this, that's too bad, But we still have five
other kids, and that's still a lot of kids, so
we'll we'll just have to write Elizabeth. Of course that
(16:00):
is not what they felt or thought, but having grown
up with that kind of mindset, never having had the
education on the differences, I didn't know that, and that's
just how I felt. I remember at that point. I
actually don't know if I fell asleep or if I
(16:22):
passed out, but one of the two happened. And when
I woke up, there was a piece of metal cable
and it was wrapped around my ankle and there were
bolts crushed into place so that I couldn't run away.
It was just long enough for me to lie down
inside the tent that they had set up, and then
long enough for me to reach a bucket, and that
(16:44):
was as far as I could move. I mean, it
wasn't a lot. It was maybe twelve feet. I mean
that's maybe as far as I could move. And I
really did feel like I had hit rock bottom in
that moment. And my captors, of course, they were they
were talking and talking about how things were going to go,
(17:10):
kind of what the rules were. They were telling me
I had a new name. They were telling me I
couldn't talk about my family, and they're saying all these
things about the future. And I'm looking around this camp
and I'm realizing, Wow, this is really hidden away, this
is really difficult to get to. This is very well supplied.
They're talking about a future. I mean, they don't plan
on killing me yet, Like they plan on keeping me
(17:32):
for for a while. How long is that? Like, it
doesn't sound like days, it sounds kind of more long term.
What if it's months. What if it's years. What if
it's so long that I actually forget who I am?
And that thought really scared me. Now I don't think
I would have actually forgotten who I was, but I
(17:53):
still had that fear regardless. And so I remember just thinking, Wow,
I'm going to remember everything about my life that I
can prior to them kidnapping, and my parents were top
priority of that list of things to remember. And I
remembered my mom one day, I'd come home from school
upset and she's trying to help me feel better, and
then she said, she said a whole bunch of things,
(18:15):
but one of the main things that she said was, Elizabeth,
you know, I may not always agree with everything that
you do, and I might not always like everyone you
decide to interact with, and I may not like all
the places you decide to go. But I'll always love
you and nothing can ever change that. And as I
(18:36):
sat on this mountain side remembering her telling me that,
I realized that she was right, that she would always
love me. That she but it wouldn't matter to her.
Love for me couldn't be altered because I'd been kidnapped,
or because I'd been raped, or because I'd been chained up.
And honestly, that was probably probably the single most important
(19:05):
thought I had while I was kidnapped, because in that moment,
I realized that I had something that my captors could
not take away. I mean, they'd taken me away from
my family, they'd taken my clothes away, they'd raped me,
they chained me up. I mean, they'd taken away my name,
they'd taken away my freedom. They'd taken away so much
(19:26):
they could they could take away my life if they
wanted to, But they could not take away the fact
that my mom would always love me, and so I
made up my mind that that would be worth surviving
for that if it meant doing whatever I had to do,
if it meant that, I would survive another day, And
(19:48):
so that's how I survived every day after that. I
would whenever my captors put me in a situation that
I didn't want to be in, which, let's face it,
that was every day. But if it was something that
I didn't want to do, or something that maybe I'd
been raised not to do that I'd grown up believing
(20:09):
not to do, I would ask myself, what will happen
to me if I don't do this? And then I'd
ask myself what will happen to me if I do this?
And that's how I would gauge my decisions on what
to do. And eventually it did become more second nature,
and from the outside looking in, it would be understandable
(20:32):
how people wouldn't like, why people wouldn't understand why I
did what they did, or why they would think I
looked like like I was okay with it, or why
I didn't appear to be struggling, because over you know,
the last twenty years, over more than that, I have
(20:54):
been questioned so many times like well, why didn't you
run away, Why didn't you scream? Why didn't you yell?
It was never because I didn't want to, and the
few attempts that I made ended very badly. I was
punished brutally, and so I did get to a point
(21:15):
where it just became second nature to do what they want,
because I had learned that's how to survive. And in
my mind when I thought about escaping, when I thought
about making my bid for freedom, I wanted it to
be a sure thing. I did not want to risk
my life, and not only did I feel like my
life was at risk, but I also felt like my
(21:36):
family's life was at risk because he threatened me every day,
not just with my life, both my family's life as well.
And for nine months I had no reason not to
believe him. I mean, he followed through everything he threatened
me with, so when he did make those threats, those
(21:57):
were very real threats. All the way up to the
day that I was rescued. During my captivity, my captors
would take me to southern California. I had convinced them
to come back to Utah. I felt like that was
my best chance to escape, and I remember police officers
(22:19):
approaching my captors and I, and they started questioning my captors,
and then they started questioning me, and initially I gave
them the answers I had been told to give. Was
I was scared to say anything that I was told
not to say. My captors were still physically standing on
(22:39):
either side of me. I mean, they were both touching me. Like,
I did not feel like I was in a safe environment.
I didn't know these police officers. I really had no
interaction with police officers before. I just felt I didn't
feel safe. I didn't feel comfortable and the officers, I mean,
(23:01):
I know they were doing their job, but at the
same time, like they were very aggressive in their questioning
and I was a shy, scared girl, and so ultimately
I was not able to admit who I was until
they had separated me from my captors and questioned me alone.
(23:22):
When I did admit who I was, they did handcuff
me and put me in the back of the car
and take me to the police station, at which point
I thought, oh, my gosh, I made the wrong choice.
I should not have said anything. They think I'm guilty.
They're going to send me to jail. They did eventually
take the handcuffs off and I was reunited with my dad.
(23:56):
Before he arrived, I was brought to this little, small room,
and I just remember thinking, this is the holding cell.
They're going to check me in, Like I thought, I
was allowed a phone call. If they thought I was innocent,
wouldn't they have taken me straight home? Wouldn't they have
let me call my parents. They must think I'm guilty,
(24:17):
they must think that I've done something wrong. And I
remember the door just bursting open, and that's when my
dad appeared, and I remember he just came running over
to me and he just grabbed me in this huge
hug and he started crying and he kept on saying, Elizabeth,
is it really you? And that was the first time
in nine months that I felt safe. That was when
(24:40):
I knew it was going to be okay, because even
if I was in trouble, my dad was there, and
I knew that he was never going to let another
person hurt me the way that these two monsters had
hurt me the last nine months. I was taken to
the police station, I was saying, to the hospital. I
was a actually brought home, and I remember getting home
(25:04):
and it genuinely felt like I mean, I felt like
I was royalty. I felt like everything that had been
taken away from me had all of a sudden been
given back. There was carpet and running water, and I mean,
most importantly, my family was all there, and I just
remember being so happy that night. That is such a
(25:25):
good memory for me. That night. The next morning, I
was in talking with my mom and I was like
turning around to leave her room, and she called me
back and she said, you know, Elizabeth, what these people
have done to you is terrible. Their aunt were strong
to describe how wicked and evil they are. They've stolen
(25:47):
nine months of your life that you will never get back.
But the best punishment you could ever give them is
to be happy. And initially when she said that advice,
I was kind of like, why are you telling me this?
Like I am happy, I'm at home, Like I was
just rescued, Like my story is done, my story is over.
Except it wasn't. I mean, my story is still being
(26:10):
written today, just as all of our stories are. That
was a chapter, certainly, but I mean there were lots
of hard things that have happened since then. I mean,
going through the court experience was hard. Coming to terms
with like my own feelings was hard. Coming to love
(26:30):
myself again was hard because even though I'd been rescued
in that moment and I was happy in that moment,
I mean that moment did eventually fade, and you know,
I would go to church again, or I would sit
in class again, and comments would be made and I
would feel less. Then I'd feel less than everyone else
(26:53):
or not as good as everyone else. And so that
took time to heal my relationship with myself. And even
though logically I could always be like, yeah, I didn't
choose to be kidnapped, I didn't choose to be raped,
I didn't choose to be heart or broken, I still
felt that way and so that did take time. And
(27:16):
you know, there were many steps in my journey, and
I am often asked, well, you know, what did you
do for your healing, or like, have you tried this
therapy or what do you think of that therapy? And
first and foremost, I am a fan of therapy. When
I was first rescued, I did not understand what it was.
I had a very antiquated idea of what it was,
(27:39):
and it was not something I feel like that was
openly spoken about back then, so I didn't want to
speak about what had happened. I was scared to open
myself up and be vulnerable with other people because I thought,
how could they possibly understand. They weren't there, they didn't
experience that. I don't even know this peron, and I
(28:00):
don't know what they have experienced. And if they have
had nothing like even close to that, why would I
want to share like the worst parts of my life
with them? Why would I even want to talk about that.
I just like, I want to leave that in the
past and I want to move forward now. Of course
I know much better. But I will say there is
no formula. There is no one size fits all. There
(28:24):
is no one modality of therapy that will work for everyone.
And if you've ever been in therapy, if you've ever
experienced it, then you know that you are the one
who has to put the work in. And this is
very much uh like, yes, there is a therapist there,
(28:45):
but like, if you're not willing to do the work,
then really you're just wasting your money. So you have
to find what works for you. And there's so many
different kinds of therapy in today's world. And there's so
many different therapists, Like I can say, if you're struggling,
(29:07):
don't give up, don't be afraid to ask for help.
Keep trying and different therapies. Keep trying, you know, different
healing pathways, positive things in your life until you figure
out what works. Don't give up on yourself because no
matter what has happened to you, what someone else has
done to you, or illness or loss of a job,
(29:31):
like you, you're worthy. Nobody else can take away your
value in this world. You should never give up on yourself.
You should constantly be working on building that positive relationship
with yourself. I mean, like the mental voice that you
hear inside your head, the one that it's so easy
to be like, oh, I'm just going to speak about
(29:51):
myself for a minute. Not that I haven't been doing
that already, but it's so easy for like my brain
to be like Elizabeth, like you should have done better.
I expect more out of you, Like why why didn't
you push harder? Why didn't you dig deep? Or why
weren't you smarter? Why weren't you more prepared? It's so
easy to have that kind of thinking, but I think
(30:12):
it's really important for us to try to flip it
to be like, you are so strong, Elizabeth. You are
so strong, You've survived every day of your life up
until now. You can keep going. You are so strong.
Do not give up like you know, and if today
doesn't work out the way you planned, You're going to
try again tomorrow, and you're going to try again the
next day. You will figure this out. You will find
(30:34):
a way through. Like I think that positive relationship, that
positive self talk, trying to switch your inner voice from
negative to positive, I think is so important and really
really powerful for ourselves. So definitely work on your relationship
with yourself, because you're worth it. I would also say
(30:56):
that there isn't any I know. I know I've already
said that there isn't anything that anyone can do to
you that can lose your value. But I really do
want to stress that everyone deserves to have happiness, Everyone
deserves to be loved everyone, everyone deserves connection. And I
(31:21):
have learned over the past long time that not not
all stories have happy endings, unfortunately, and in many cases
of abuse and violence, most of the time comes from
people that you know. And so initially, when I was
(31:44):
at home, when I first came home. As I said,
I was hesitant to share my story. I was hesitant
to speak out because I didn't think anyone could understand.
But then as years went by, began to meet more
and more survivors, and I began to hear more and
more stories, and I realize actually how common it is.
(32:05):
It's important to share our stories because we're not alone.
There are so many other survivors. Whatever your story is,
there is someone out there who's experiencing the same thing.
Maybe the details are different, maybe the circumstances are different,
but there's someone out there who is experiencing the same thing.
And it's so powerful to know that you're not alone.
(32:29):
When I came home, I did feel very alone, but
now I don't because I know there are so many
other survivors out there. And that's why I share my story,
so that they know that they're not alone, so that
they know that there's someone else out there who's experienced
the same thing and they don't need to be ashamed
or embarrassed. And it also helped me realize how lucky
(32:51):
I am because I was kidnapped by a stranger. I
was raped by a stranger, and as I mentioned, most people.
If they're kidnapped or raped, they typically know they're perpetrators.
And I cannot imagine how difficult it would be to
ever trust again because that level of betrayal is so deep.
(33:13):
I cannot imagine how difficult it would be just to
climb into your own bed at night, because you might
not know who's going to climb into bed next to you.
So to all those survivors out there who are struggling
with past abuse, like you are incredible, You are absolutely amazing,
You are so strong, Do not give up on yourself.
(33:37):
And then finally, I would want you to know that, yes,
it can feel like these chapters of our life define us.
It's so easy for me to go out and feel
like when people come up and talk to me, they're
just looking at me as Elizabeth Smart, the girl that
was kidnapped. And sometimes I think, but that's not all,
(33:59):
that's not all of me, Like I'm so much more
than just that one part of my life. I mean,
now I'm married, and I have kids, and I like running,
and I like reading books, and I don't like doing dishes,
but yet I find myself doing them every day nonetheless.
(34:20):
But I mean, like we are all so much more
than the worst moments of our life. And yes, other
people might look at you that way, but ultimately, I
feel like we define ourselves, and we define ourselves not
so much by what happens to us, but how we
respond and what we do next. We define ourselves through
(34:42):
our actions and our choiceices. And so don't give up
on yourself. I mean, keep believing in yourself, share your story,
love yourself, give yourself some grace, and remember you choose
who you get to be. And so with that being said,
I just want to say thank you again for allowing
me to guest host this this session, this podcast of
(35:05):
Let's Be Clear. Thank you and God bless you. M
M m m
Host
Shannen Doherty
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