Kidnapped Daughter Reunites with Parents 23 Years Later

As a child in the '80s and the height of "stranger danger," I was always sensitive to kidnapping. I hated watching stranger danger filmstrips in school, and I constantly worked out potential escape strategies in my head in case I was every snatched or attempted to be snatched. I was also fascinated by the made-for-TV movie starring Corky Nemic (aka Parker Lewis, who, if you haven't heard, is incapable of losing) called "I Know My First Name is Steven," about a kid who was kidnapped at a young age, whose captor changed his name, and who eventually in his teen years reunited with his family.

Now that I have a kid, kidnapping is even more terrifying, which is why I'm so hell bent on teaching Daughter the ways of the samurai.

Anyway, what prompted this trip down nightmare lane was an insane story I came across today. A woman who was kidnapped 23 years ago from a hospital in New York, when she was only 19 days old, got suspicious a few years ago and decided to check things out. After checking the online database for missing and exploited children, she eventually reunited with her birth parents, who are, of course, ecstatic. That's crazy to me. This poor girl has lived her whole life thinking that her name and parents were one thing, only to figure out that she is actually someone else, not unlike Luke Skywalker, although it would appear her real parents are not Siths.