On June 11th, 1991, eleven year old Jaycee Lee Dugard was kidnapped by Nancy and Phillip Garrido. Jaycee was held prisoner in their backyard for 18 years. Lonely, scared, and devastated, Jaycee desperately wanted her old life back. She spent hours, days, weeks, months, and years in the backyard by herself. Jaycee became an object for Phillip to abuse for the next 18 years. At age 14, Jaycee (A.K.A. Alissa) became a mother. Alissa's words the night her first daughter was born are, "My baby girl came into the world at 4:35am, August 18th, 1994. I am 14 years old and very, very scared"(Dugard 109). She raised her daughter in the backyard for 3 years until she found out she was expecting again. On November 12th, 1997, Alissa gave birth to her second daughter. Alissa did the best she could caring for these daughters until August 21st, when the police started questioning the Garrido's. Finally, after hours of questioning at the police station, Phillip Garrido was placed into prison, and Alissa and her two daughters were reunited with her family. As life got back to as normal as it could get, Jaycee went to therapeutic healing to help deal with her abduction and depression.
Jaycee was 11 years old and didn't know what to expect. At the beginning she was always questioning Phillip because she wasn't sure what was going on. As, she got older, she still didn't want to upset Phillip, but then again she didn't really care. You can see from this quote her character development, " Hoping in my heart I would not get in trouble, but also not really caring at the moment"(Dugard 130). When she was younger, she didn't want to upset Phillip, but as she got older, she didn't really care anymore. Jaycee didn't try to run away or get herself out. She was scared that if she was caught, bad things would happen. I agree with her on this one, but if I was her I would've tried a little harder to find my way out, even if it was impossible. The family would go to the parks and beaches and I would've tried to tell someone and ask for help instead of just blend in like Jaycee did. Also, I think Jaycee was very mature when she was making decisions and she did the best she could. She was great with what she had with her daughters and even tried to teach them in the backyard. I think that was really smart of her, especially since her education was only to a 5th grade level. Overall, I think that Jaycee should be proud of herself and what she accomplished. Now she is a surviving story for many, many years to come.