People Who Have Been Kidnapped Explain How They Escaped Their Captors

According to the Polly Klaas Foundation, 99.8 percent of children who go missing do come home. In fact, the organization points out, "Nearly 90% of missing children have simply misunderstood directions or miscommunicated their plans, are lost, or have run away."
9 percent of children are kidnapped by family members in custody disputes. 3 percent are abducted by family members, and the kidnapper is often someone the child knows. In fact, less than 1 percent are kidnapped in the cases of "stranger danger" you likely grew up hearing about. Half of those children, the organization notes, end up coming home.
One Redditor asked:
"People who've been kidnapped, how did you survive?"

"I was kidnapped..."
"I was kidnapped in my car, when I was 18. I had been stalked by the guy for at least a few days (saw the same truck follow me a couple times on my way to college campus). I was just about to get out of my car to go to a bookstore, and this guy jumps in the passenger seat with a gun. He made me drive out of town to a remote area where his truck was parked (never found out how he followed me to bookstore without the truck)."
"He wanted to keep the gun on me while he got out of the car because I had a mace thing on my keychain. As he was backing out, he slipped and lost his footing, and I took off in the car. I drove straight to the police station. He was never caught."
"I was on my way home..."
"Almost. Age of eleven. Do NOT go to second location. Fight like hell to stay in the first. Even if you get taken anyway, raising a huge noise can cause a witness to come see what's happening to you and they can report it."
"I was on my way home from school for lunch and some guy in a small quarter ton truck gets out, claims he's a police officer and tells me to get in the truck. Right away I'm thinking I'm not going anywhere with this clown. He claimed to be a cop and I asked where's your badge? While he's launching into this rant about how much trouble I'll be in if I don't do as he says in my head I'm thinking all we have to do is bolt behind the house right next to us. That neighbourhood had a whole mess of pathways that went all over the place. If we make it to that, there's no way that guy is gonna catch us."
"I straight up told him I'm not going anywhere with you. That caught him off guard, like he wasn't used to someone challenging him. He got this scared look on his face and got back in his truck. Then he tries laying this bullshit on us he's some secret undercover cop and don't tell anyone he's there."
"Yeah right, my friend and I, we both ran home and told our parents first thing. They called the cops and we gave a full description of both the truck and the guy. The friend who was with me actually remembered the license plate. After that I couldn't tell you what happened, we never got an update from the police and never saw that guy ever again."
"She didn't mistreat me..."
"I was kidnapped way before my memories formed so this is all from my parents and the police report."
"Basically, a lady in the nursing ward decided to give me a "spicy adoption" by hiding me in some sheets and taking me out of the hospital. She was tracked down a few days later and I was handed back to my parents."
"She didn't mistreat me, apparently I was a healthy normal child and she even bought the expensive stuff in order to take care of me."
"I got to meet her in my teens, I asked her "why me" and it was because my family hadn't done the paperwork for me correctly so I was easier to slip out and potentially give her more time to disappear with me."
"I got very, very lucky."
"I got very, very lucky. The two men who kidnapped me from a bus stop (I was 16) had clearly done so with others before. They'd removed the door handles from the back seat doors, so when I tried to make my way out at a red light I couldn't get the door open. I'm pretty sure they intended to kill me."
"They drove me to an abandoned gas station. A police car drove up to check out what was happening. The man in the back seat with me at that time threatened to slit my throat if I screamed, while his partner got out and convinced the cop that I was his niece, and that he and my "dad" brought me out to talk to me. He said they needed to set me straight because I'd been acting out."
"The cop insisted they leave the station right then, and he followed our car back to the highway. They got so worried he'd remember them if my body turned up the next day that they decided to release me right then. I got thrown down a gravel embankment along the highway, and ran in the dark to a nearby open restaurant."
"I will never forget lying there in the wet grass after coming to rest at the bottom of the embankment, gazing up at a sky filled with stars, and realizing that, holy hell! I was somehow still alive."
"I was very, very lucky."
"The family member..."
"I was kidnapped when I was 7. It was by a very drug ridden family member who told me he was bringing me out for ice cream. He left me on a bench outside of a bar when the bartender told him he couldn't bring kids in. It was a dirty biker bar in Las Vegas during the 90's. I was young, scared and didn't fully comprehend the situation. I was confused why we didn't go to an ice cream shop."
"The family member came out with two men that fully terrified me. One of them touched my curly bright red hair and smiled wide. I remember not knowing what to do so I started scream singing Joan Osborne's "What if god was one of us." They got freaked when I wouldn't stop singing and walked back in the bar. I was definitely a weird kid but scream singing as self defense was kind of smart."
"I was left alone on the bench again when a man walked up and asked me where my parents were. I told him I didn't get ice cream and wanted to go back to my mom but my family member wouldn't let me. He walked in the bar but came out just a minute later and sat with me until the police arrived."
"20 years later my mom saw that family member for the first time. He was on end of life hospice care but made it to another family members funeral. When everyone was filtering out he was waiting on the bus home when my mom punched him in the face. I love my mom."
"At the time..."
"I was kidnapped at gunpoint along with my younger brother and my early-twenties mother when I was in kindergarten. My father (~40 years old) hadn't taken the divorce well and already had some psychiatric illness, so he forced us all into his truck and drove us from California to Mexico."
"At the time my parents told us kids that we were taking a family trip. I remember the drive, shopping in a street market, and being greeted by the flashing lights of police cars when we eventually returned to the states. The police were nice and let us sit in the police car! I remember being excited about that."
"The next thing I remember was coming home to dead pets (I think just two mice, but still). Then being upset that I had missed picture day in school when I saw the other kids receiving their photos. I'm not sure how long we were in Mexico but maybe that'll help set the time frame."
"I'm not sure what would have happened if my father hadn't decided to take us back."
"I was eating dinner..."
"I was "kidnapped" at 17 by goons my parents hired to take me to rehab when they found out I smoked pot."
"I was eating dinner with my parents when all of a sudden they got up and walked out of the room with no explanation, then a few seconds later two huge guys showed up out of nowhere blocking both the exits to the kitchen and told me to come with them."
"Since they didn't identify themselves at all or tell me what was going on, I assumed i was being kidnapped for real, so I grabbed a kitchen stool and started swinging. I took one down but the other guy tackled and handcuffed me."
"After they forced me into a car, they explained who they were and that they were taking me to a "wilderness program" in Georgia. We were in DC so I spent the next few hours apologizing, sucking up to them, and basically trying to get them as much on my side as possible."
"It worked because they stopped for food and told me they would take off the handcuffs and let me eat if I promised to behave. I was a model citizen all throughout dinner and when we got back in the car they didn't put the handcuffs back on."
"A few hours later we stopped for gas. It was dark by then and I asked to use the bathroom. One guy was filling the car with gas, and I noticed the guy who was escorting me to the bathroom was limping badly (I learned later I shattered his kneecap with the stool) so I figured it was my chance to escape."
"I made a break for it - I had a good head start on the guy pumping gas and the limping guy couldn't keep up. I ran into the woods next to the gas station and just kept going."
These are some harrowing stories. Do you have similar stories to share? Let us know in the comments below.
It's highly believed that it is important to learn history as a means to improve our future.
What is often overlooked is that what is taught in history class is going to be very different depending on where you went to school.
And this isn't just internationally, even different regions of the United states will likely have very different lessons on American history.
This frequently results in our learning fascinating, heartbreaking and horrifying historical facts which our middle or high school history teachers neglected to teach us.
Redditor Acherontia_atropos91 was curious to learn things people either wished they had learned, or believe they should have learned, in their school history class, leading them to ask:
What isn’t taught in history class but should be?
The Irish Troubles
"The troubles."
"Too many people in America do not understand why a wall straight through Ireland would be a BAD idea."
"I’m referring to the Brexit referendum and possible outcomes."
"If people were wondering why we were talking about walls through Ireland in the first place."- CLCVS.
Forgotten elements of World War II
"What the Japanese did to the Chinese during WW2."
"Unit 731."- CaptainMcBoogerJew.
"Japan gets off easy for their war crimes in WW2."
"They killed an estimated 16mil Chinese civilians and another 8mil soldiers"
"Also, Pol Pot."
"Didn't know who he was until I was like 25."
"Worst dictator all time (in terms of percentage of population he decimated)".
The truth about the American Revolution
"That the American Revolution was part of a wider cold war type of conflict with France."
"The American Revolution was basically the UK's equivalent of the US version of Vietnam."- vinsant7.
The Dark side of Swedish history.
"As a Swede, I'd like to know more of all the horrible sh*t my country has done throughout history."
"It's a damn shame we're trying to hide our history."
"For example, Swedes killed a metric sh*t ton of all Polish people when we were at our strongest."
"That's the kinda sh*t we don't get to learn."- mogwandayy.
Colonization
"Basically what Belgium did to the Congo."
"A lot of people are telling me that they are taught about this actually."
"I'm glad to hear it because I wasn't taught about this in the USA during my public school days (1995-2008)."- EconArch.
The truth about "heroes".
"While teaching about historical Heroes they should also tell students about the unspeakable things some of them did."
"Many famous figures throughout history who are pillars of morality actually did many terrible things." - User Deleted
Intolerance for Mental Illness
"The dark history of mental illness treatments."
"I think it's worth learning about."- 7dayexcerpt.
Slavic Mythology
"Slavic mythology in Slavic countries."
"Don't get me wrong, I love both Greek & Roman mythology and as a person from the Balkans both of those cultures are part of my country's history and had great influence over not only my region but the entirety of the continent & the western world but I wouldn't mind knowing more about Slavic mythology as well."- ShorsShezzarine.
The truth about the CIA
"How the CIA was made and all the shady things they did over the years."- ALargeChip.
There is a lot about the history of our world, not to mention our own country which shouldn't be ignored.
And it's from learning from our mistakes that we really improve our future.
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So apparently we are in the endemic phase of this nonsense.
We have light at the end of the tunnel.
So what now?
Where do we go from here?
Normal seems like an outdated word.
How do we get back to normal though?
Is it even possible?
What are reaching back to?
Life pre-Covid.
Those were the days.
If only we could bring them back.
Redditor hetravelingsong wanted to discuss our new normal in this hopeful "endemic" phase. So they asked:
"What’s something random you miss about pre-COVID times?"
I miss people being sane. Though that maybe election cycle issues not COVID. We'll never know.
I thought I was Alone...
"Being able to grocery shop after 11 pm."
Reading_Rainboner
"Hell yes. I miss the days where the Walmart across the street was open 24 hours."
Small_Tax_9432
let's just go...
"I miss spontaneity... everything now seems to have a barrier of difficulty."
iidosee
"I live very close to Disneyland so I have an annual pass. My friends and I would just go there after work and hang out and grab a bite to eat."
"Now, we have to reserve a day to go. And most of the time, the days are at 'full' capacity so we couldn't even reserve. I don't want to schedule to hang out at Disneyland for a couple hours for July. So yeah, I definitely miss the 'lets go eat at Disneyland tonight?' texts."
mymymissmai
Not til 24-25
"Functioning global supply chains. Ah, the product you want has got microchips in it? 9 month wait."
richard-king
"Minimum, I'd been saying for a while now that I wouldn't expect a true return to normalcy in terms of electronics prices till 2024-2025. Although Crypto crashing through the floor really took some of the pressure off graphics cards which I really appreciate."
statiiic
WTF?!?!
"How affordable everything was!"
Disastrous_Hour_6776
"Yep. Today I was bagging up my things at the grocery store and I heard the cashier say to the lady behind me 'thats $78.12.' She had -- 2 boxes of Kellogg's corn flakes, a carton of 12 eggs, milk, strawberries, raspberries, blue berries, a small cheese cake, English muffins, coffee, and a small whole frozen chicken that could maybe feed 3 people if the meat portioning was small."
SnowyInuk
Sushi
"My favorite sushi place. It was good quality, close by, kid-friendly, and not too expensive."
InannasPocket
All of this... it was a simpler time.
NASTY
"As a retail worker, just how f**king NASTY some people have gotten."
DmitriPetrov*itch
"They applauded you for being an essential worker but won’t vote for policies that’ll raise minimum wage while insisting a wage cap for heavily paid employees."
sketchysketchist
CHANGES your DNA...
"Some of the people closest to me became very bitter and petty over the last 2 years. So many people have the 'crazy eyes' now."
__--__7
"So true and holidays with the family is like who has the biggest tinfoil hat building contest. How many jumps does your brain have to go through to think that the Covid vaccine CHANGES your DNA into the patented DNA so that the government now controls your body."
"So like vaccinated people now have a singular DNA set. I feel like I still have a chunk of my brain just broken off due to that comment alone. I was also told by same family member that I could never donate blood again due to the vaccine. I guess it is so my patented DNA doesn't affect people?? FYI my vaccinated butt just donated today fine and multiple other times after the vaccine."
tyreka13
Homeward Bound
"House prices."
adrianinked
"I'm resigned to never thinking I have a chance on owning property where I live. I'm 30 and just can't imagine it anymore. And I don't want to live anywhere else so, whatever."
Osdab2daf
"That didn’t happen because of the pandemic. That was already happening regardless."
CH11DW
Oh Mickey
"All Day Breakfast at McDonalds."
hutch2522
"It was honestly hell to do, and not very popular. ITs margins aren't anywhere dinner and lunch specials. ON top of that, the temperatures are such that They require its own grill, meaning that if you have 2 grills in shop, you are down 50% of lunch capacity."
Freyas_Follower
Way back when...
"Hanging out with friends. And I mean waaaaaay before Covid. Like 2006 back when I had some friends."
LoocsinatasYT
I miss the old days. Maybe we'll get back there.
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What do you believe?
Is there a GOD in the sky?
Is he guiding us and helping us?
Life is really hard. Why is that is a big entity is up there loving us?
Atheists have taken a lot of heat for what feels like shunning GOD.
What if they've been right all along?
Maybe let's take a listen and see what they really think.
Redditor __Jacob______ wanted to hear from the people who don't really believe all that "God" stuff. They asked:
"Atheists, what do you believe in?"
I'm waffling between G-O-D and nothing. So please give me some education.
911
"We need to look out for each other because help isn't coming."
cknipe
Peace Out
"More than 2 decades ago, a priest was giving a sermon in my church and he said 'our faith requires you to believe without question. Why call it faith if you have to ask questions?' I haven't returned to church. Not until my wedding day but you know what I mean."
asiangontear
Delusion
"When I was young I used to think that after death you would have access to a PC that you could see absolutely anything about your life. Stats, any question you had no matter how obscure, replays of moments, perspectives of others in relation to you. No matter what you wanted to know, if it was relatable to you, you could see it. I know it's silly, but as time goes on I just want it to be real, and I don't think I'd have any issue allowing myself to fall into that delusion."
eggwardpenisglands
I think nothing happens...
"Realistically, I think nothing happens. We literally experience nothing after death. Same thing that we experience before birth. We don't exist, so it's nothing. I think the tenant that we should follow while living is to try to be happy and healthy while minimizing the damage we do to each other."
"What I would LIKE to happen after death is whatever you believe in, exists. I think Christians should get to go to heaven if they truly believe in it, Hindus and Buddhists get reincarnated, and everyone else also gets to experience what they believe they will experience."
"'I would still experience Nothing. Maybe it's one of those things where at the moment of death their brain makes them experience what feels like an infinitely long moment in time where they experience their afterlife. I just think it would be neat for everybody."
Better_Meat_
Shrug
"Best advice I received from a dear senior on their way out. 'You win some, you lose some' shrug. Nothing divine, life is that simple and wonderful, accept it and move on."
Tune_Kindly
It all sounds pretty simple. Why are people so up in arms about Atheists?
Whatever
"I believe in a universe that doesn't care, and people that do."
imCIK
Cool with Empty
"Nothing. [Serious]."
rumblingtummy29
"I feel this way about death. When I was 5, my grandfather died and my cousin simple said, he is dead, that means you are gone forever. Everything ends up dying, even plants and animals. I'm now in my 40's and still have this simplistic view of life and death. People think I'm ambivalent to life and death but it's just what it is."
thepigfish82
puppet-masters...
"I think a lot of religious people struggle with the fact that we are all just swirling units of chaos. There is no grand plan or great orchestrator. I think that’s why people who are prone to religion are also susceptible to things like Q anon and the Cabal and all that. They REALLY want to believe that there is some almighty puppet-master who determines all of humanity’s fate."
Lngtmelrker
“we’re living in a society!”
"Just be a kind and empathetic person not because you’re worried about some cosmic justice, but because it’s the right thing to do. If there is some being that created us there’s no way they actually care about believing in it or adhering to some rules from over 2000 years ago."
"Also a big thing for me is that I find the idea that you need religion or the Bible in order to have morals and ethics pretty dumb. It’s pretty f**king clear that most evangelicals have neither. But my main thing is being a good person simply because, as George Costanza once said we’re living in a society!' If you’re only a good person in order to make it to heaven you probably aren’t actually a good and moral person."
conservative_genius
That's All
"You're born. You live. You die. That's it. After you die you cease to exist, the same as before you were born."
serefina
Believe what you want. We're all here together. So let's focus there.
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The list of what irritates me is endless.
I mean... breathing too loud or dust can set me off.
I'm a bit unstable, yes.
But I'm not alone.
So let's discuss.
Redditor Aburntbagel6 wanted to hear about all the times many of us just couldn't control our disdain. They asked:
"What never fails to piss you off?"
I feel like this article can go on forever. Let's get some highlights.
Wasted Time
"Meetings that could and should have been an email."
Sirena609
Lotto People
"Getting stuck behind people playing the lottery at a corner store."
thenuggetlover
"I also used to work in a gas station and you’re SO right. I f**king hated the lottery people. Especially since my store had a small staff and there was usually only one of us working at a time, which meant that I couldn’t get any of my other work done as long as they were there."
"And you’re right, it’s also pretty sad to watch. I had one lady who used to come in every day and spent hundreds and HUNDREDS of dollars on scratch tickets. One day, she won $200 after spending probably around $600 and she was so excited and saying she can 'finally pay her bills.'"
i-am-your-god-now
Aware...
"No situational awareness. Job, home, shopping, driving. Think for one minute and go about. OBSERVE!!"
Dizzy-Foundation8122
"My mom is one of those people who leave the shopping cart in the middle of the damn aisle and proceed to walk twenty feet away. After correcting her a million times to no effect I just walk away now so people don’t know I’m with her."
OutrageousEvent
Shut Up!
"Endless barking in the middle of the night, I love animals but that sh*t I can't stand."
Acceptable-Lemon2924
"Endless barking in general drives me up a wall. One of my friends dogs was barking almost an entire gaming session the other day. I wanted to reach through the computer and smack him for letting it go on."
bangersnmash13
Kindness
"People being mean to service workers, especially if the workers are very young."'
scaryboilednoodles
All of these things. I hate them all.
Admit It
"People who never accept fault when they mess something up. Like, why blame a million people when it was clearly you who did it???"
Quirky-Area-8978
From Above
"My upstairs neighbors."
lutzow89
"I had terrible neighbors at my previous apartment. It was a one person studio for students, but her boyfriend was clearly living with her illegally and he was loud."
"One night we knocked n the door at 3 AM because of the loud music and an unknown girl opened the door. I just thought they were having a little party. But the next door I saw the girl living there come home with a suitcase after having been away for the weekend... Her BF was cheating on her in her own apartment."
Th3_Accountant
Move Away
"People who sit directly next to me at the airport, movie theater, any other place where you can choose a seat when there is PLENTY of other seating."
BacardiPardy33
"I can’t YES this enough and the ones who can’t park for crap so they park so close you can’t open doors on one side of the car or the ones who park directly behind when you pulled through so the door won’t open to load groceries."
BacardiPardy33
It's Over
"People who try to restart old drama. Like I'm done with you, just leave me alone."
Tired_Potatos
"Yep, half the reason I've basically quit playing one of my favorite online video games. People keep bringing old crap up or sh*tting on on someone who used to be our friend. I got tired of it so I just ejected the game out of me."
CaucasianHumus
AHHHHH!!!
"People walking too slow in front of me with no way to get around them. It’s even worse if it’s a couple or group taking up the whole sidewalk. HAVE SOME SPATIAL AWARENESS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!"
_-v0x-_
Life in general pisses me off. I'm easy.
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