and give you reasons why he is right. I’m now able to make decisions for myself and my girls, and although they have not always been the right choices, they were still mine to make and that feels good despite the bad decision. One example of this is going to Sly Park with my daughters for a friend’s birthday campout. I wanted to go but was warned about the dangers of the paparazzi and snapping some pictures. I am headstrong and I wanted my girls to be able to see the Perseid meteor shower in the darkness of a campsite, so I chose to take them. We had a fabulous time camping out under the stars. We laid our blankets and sleeping bags and watched as the flashes of light darted across the sky. We also played in the lake and ate pie for dinner and hamburgers for dessert! We had a great time together and didn’t realize our privacy was being violated. Upon returning home and learning of the pictures that were taken that weekend, I was immediately saddened and embarrassed. I also felt horribly that I had inadvertently put my girls in the public eye again. What was supposed to be a fun trip before school started turned into a nightmare. Thank goodness for Nancy Seltzer, my public relations manager. She was able to get the girls’ faces blurred in the tabloid pictures, saving them from unwanted attention. All I want is for my girls to have the privacy and freedom they deserve in the days ahead and, thanks to NS, we can have that awhile longer.
Another emotion I felt during that ordeal was doubt in myself. I felt I could no longer be trusted to make sound decisions. I felt that because I had made the decision and it turned out to be the wrong choice, then all my future choices would be no good, too. It took a few sessions with my therapist to get me to see that it was okay to make the decision I did. That it was better that I went despite some advice that it could be dangerous because it was a public place, because if I had not gone and heeded the advice I was given, I would never have truly known if it was safe or not to go and would have resented the advice. So it was better to have made the decision I did and learn from it. Also, not all choices are black and white. We all have the right to make up our own minds about stuff, but it’s better when you have all the facts and go in to make an informed decision. Looking back, I should have researched where Sly Park was and asked some questions about how public it was before I made the decision to go.
Milestones
Even though I was closed off to the outside world in the backyard, the outside world did find a way to touch us. I remember 9/11, the day the terrorists flew planes into the Twin Towers, killing all those people. I remember exactly where I was when Phillip came running outside to tell me. He yelled in his sad voice, “Allissa, did you hear? Someone just crashed a plane into one of the Twin Towers!” I was outside going to pee in my pee hole. My outdoor toilet was full and Phillip didn’t like to empty it very often. I made myself a pee hole outside, so I was out there when I heard the news. I rushed back in the studio and the news was on channel three. They were showing pictures of the buildings smoking and helicopters circling. It was so scary. I kept on thinking, I wonder what else they were going to bomb. And who had done it? Then the news reporter started talking about all the people that were trapped inside and I started crying. Phillip and Nancy were crying, too. Phillip said the “angels” made those terrorists do what they did and that’s why he had to expose the “angels” to the world one day. It made more sense than anything else in the world did at the time.
Other than 9/11, there were no real “events” in my life to recall. I didn’t really have any of the typical milestones that other kids enjoy. Like first crush, first date, getting my driver’s license. I remember, I think I was twenty-one or twenty-two and I had gone with Phillip for the drive to the paper place where we got our paper for the printing business in Concord. We got stuck in traffic coming home. Traffic always makes me feel sick. I felt like I was going to throw up, so he pulled over for a minute. He said it was too bad I was sick because he was going to teach me how to drive that day. I was feeling too sick to say anything, so I just shrugged. On the inside I was so disappointed. I wonder if he really was going to teach me to drive that day. I always wanted to learn how to drive. My girls always thought it was weird that I didn’t know how to drive yet. They would ask me why, and I would say because I didn’t want to and maybe one day I would. What else could I say? They asked their dad, too, but he would say something like, “Allissa will be able to learn how to drive one day and I am really looking forward to that day.” Again I would wonder when that day would ever come. One time I was out shopping with Nancy and she said, why don’t you sit in the driver’s seat and give it a try? I was a little scared. I was probably twenty-five or twenty-six at the time and had never even sat in the driver’s seat before. It was a foreign concept to me even though I longed to be able to drive. I did get in the driver’s seat and she said to start it up, and I did, but I guess I hit the accelerator a little too hard and almost backed into the truck that was coming in behind us. Nancy got a little freaked out and that was the last time she let me try. So I didn’t learn to drive until I was twenty-nine and out in the real world.
I can’t say I remember turning sixteen. I was already a mom. My oldest daughter was almost two by then. I also never got the chance to graduate from high school (although I do hope to earn my GED one day).
I do remember, however, when my sister, Shayna, turned sixteen. I was twenty-six and by then living in Phillip’s secret backyard in my own tent! I loved the freedom of having my own room. When the printing business was making good money, Phillip would give me and Nancy an allowance to spend. I bought roses to put around my tent and used the bamboo growing in the back to make my own fence surrounding my room. I planted morning glories, purple ones, and they grew up to engulf my makeshift fence of bamboo. I made a walking path of stones to the front of my room, so when it rained I wouldn’t get sand in there. I had my own things, and Nancy and I would go thrift store shopping for clothes, knickknacks, and shoes.
I remember waking up on January 16th, 2006, and the very first thing I did that morning was say out loud to nobody in particular, ’cause I was all by myself out there, I said, “Happy Sixteenth Birthday, Shayna!” I really wished I could be there to celebrate with her on that day. I wondered what she looked like and if she was happy. I wonder if she had a sweet sixteen birthday party. I so wanted to be with her on that day. That’s all I could think about all day for some reason. Phillip Garrido took many things from me, and watching my sister grow up was one of them. I have loved my sister since the day she was born and dreamed about one day being her best friend. I was always a shy kid and she represented a twenty-four-hour companion for me. Although it was hard sometimes to watch how much Carl loved her more than me, that didn’t change my feelings toward her. I have never really thought of her as my half sister, she’s always just been my little sis. I wanted so much to do things with her. Like, I couldn’t wait for her to get older, so we could ride the bus together. I would see the other girls with their sisters and couldn’t wait for the day when I could introduce my little sister to them. Or if my sister was being picked on, as her older sister I could come to the rescue and chase away all the bullies. I had so many plans for us, but all of it was stolen away.
When I saw my now grown-up little sister for the first time at age nineteen, I was amazed. She was so beautiful and tall. She was wearing white that day. My first thought: I wonder if she’s a nurse? But I learned later she wasn’t. She was still in college and trying to decide what she wants to be in this world. I think she should take all the time she needs to figure that out. She’s very smart and perceptive. It has been hard getting to know her. I have been so busy with my own kids, and she has a life of her own. From her perspective: She was a baby when Phillip took me from our family. She never knew me. She grew up hearing about her sister “Jaycee” that was kidnapped when she was eleven years old, but she didn’t remember me. On the other hand, I remember her and I remember playing with her as a baby. I just didn’t know the person she grew up to be. We have plenty of time to build a lasting friendship. The base is already there, which is our deep love for one another; the rest will come with time.
Me and Shayna, the year I was taken
