Victims of repeated abuse suffer complex trauma

Victims of repeated abuse suffer complex trauma
Story Highlights
It's challenging for people freed from captivity to adjust to a new life

Experts in child sexual abuse cases say perpetrators mentally manipulate kids

Recovery is possible, but it could take several years.
By Madison Park
CNN

(CNN) -- For 18 years, a girl who was whisked away into a secret backyard compound was forced to grow up in isolation.

By the time authorities discovered Jaycee Lee Dugard, she was a 29-year-old mother of two who had spent more than half of her life in sheds. One of the alleged abductors, Phillip Garrido, is the father of her two daughters, according to police.

Garrido and his wife, Nancy, face 29 felony counts, including kidnapping for sexual purposes, forcible rape and forcible lewd acts on a child. They pleaded not guilty Friday. The maximum penalty for each defendant, if convicted, is life imprisonment.

Dugard, who disappeared from South Lake Tahoe, California, in 1991, faces a challenging road to recovery. Dr. Kerry Landry, a child psychiatrist in Durham, North Carolina, said that repeated abuse causes complex trauma.

"They can really feel like they have no control and there is no escape," Landry said.
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Victims of repeated abuse suffer complex trauma