What thing? I repeated my question again and she thought for a minute and then looked up at me and asked if I really wanted to know what that was and I said, Yes I do, I want to know. And she said she had caught him once torturing an animal, and I said was it one of my cats, and she nodded her head a few times in the affirmative and then said, “No, no it was a mouse I caught him torturing,” and I said, “A mouse?” She said, “Yes, it was a mouse.” I didn’t expect that answer. But all I said was, Doesn’t that make you wonder what else he did? How about all the times we didn’t know where he was? If he could hurt a helpless animal, doesn’t that make you wonder what else he was capable of? And she said yes, it did make her wonder. I’d like to believe she felt badly for me all those years, but in a way it was always a selfish act on her part. Yes, she didn’t want me to go through all that, but to turn a blind eye to what she knew he was doing to an eleven-year-old girl. How could she entertain little girls in the van and videotape them doing the splits and other things, all for her husband? I guess she just convinced herself that she was doing it for love. To me that is not love. You do not follow someone blindly as they lead you over a cliff. She said that she was scared when I walked in because she thought that I would hate her. I told her although I do not hate her because I do not want to pollute my body with hate, what she and Phillip did to me and my family was unforgivable. That my mom suffered more than any person should have to suffer and my sister and aunt, too, and the other members of my family. She said she hoped one day that my mom could forgive her, and I said I wouldn’t hold out for that. She told me that call her crazy, but she still loves Phillip. I told her she needed to stop thinking of what’s best for Phillip because he is going to be in jail for the rest of his life and to start thinking about what was best for her, and if she wanted to see her brothers again and have a relationship with her family that Phillip tried to separate her from. I told her to take care of herself. And I told her good-bye for the last time; I told her I would not be back. That although we didn’t get to say good-bye to each other at the parole office, that this is good-bye forever. And then I stood up and walked out.
Reflection
So much has happened since that meeting. For the most part I’ve been able to focus on my daily life, but in the back of my mind I know that I might eventually have to face Nancy again. Walking away that day confirmed my right to make my own decisions. The fate of Phillip and Nancy was truly out of my hands. I realized in that moment how much I have grown when Nancy’s attorney felt it necessary to challenge me to call him. The El Dorado County Sheriff’s Office supported me to make my own decisions. I know I owe the Garridos nothing and can’t understand why Nancy’s attorney felt it necessary to ask me to support the very people who abducted me.
Therapeutic Healing with a Twist
The days following our recovery were a time of limbo for all of us. I really didn’t want a therapist. I felt I had come to terms with what happened to me and I just didn’t want to relive it. Boy, was I wrong. Once I sat down and talked to the therapist they brought in, I realized I did want someone to talk to. I responded to her authentic and down-to-earth personality. Neither she nor her colleague treated me like I was special or damaged in some way. I wasn’t the main focus of the group or singled out in an odd way.
Reunification was unique in the fact that it focused on getting my feet on the ground, and during the reunification work we focused on reconnecting me to different facets of my family and dealt with the everyday practical things that I had not been accustomed to such as getting the kids their shots and overall checkups, which we never had the opportunity to do before. The girls had never been to a doctor before. We also went to see a dentist and got our teeth checked out. All of our teeth were in pretty good shape.