I'm 25 years old and I've been kidnapped twice before the age of 17.

When I was 9 years old I went to a fair with my dad, and at the fair I won a stuffed animal at the shooting gallery, a rabbit I believe, and the guy who gave it to me gave me his business card, saying I could come to his house and shoot more targets to keep the animal. He told me to give it to my parents, but I wanted to keep it so I put it in my pocket. When I left with my dad he asked me about the card and I told him what happened and we decided to call the guy to see if we could set up a time to go to his house, and we were surprised to find out he lived less than a mile from where we did, and he said we could bring the card with the animal as proof.<br><br>We went to his house and met his wife and daughter, and they let me shoot the targets. It was cool and I enjoyed myself and we left after about 30 minutes, and about a year after that we went back several times, and I never had any issues. I saw a gun or two in the room where the targets were, but I wasn't concerned about it because I was 9 years old. It wasn't until I was 14 and was staying at a friend's house that his dad pulled out a picture of me from a birthday party when I was 11, and he pointed to the picture and said "Do you remember this guy?", and I looked at the picture and recognized the guy as the shooting gallery guy, and his wife said "I'm sorry, I didn't realize that's where he came from", and his dad said "He was kidnapped, he was held for ransom." And I freaked out and immediately called my mom. I went to her house and my dad was there, and they told me what happened and where I went. I remember my mom crying a lot when she told me, and it was all very traumatic and I didn't speak to my dad for a long time after that.<br><br>The guy had kidnapped me twice, the second time I was 13 and he had taken me for a weekend, but he was arrested before my mom could pay the ransom. They were worried he would try to kill me if he found out they had called the police. But thankfully he was caught and put in jail before that could happen.<br><br>I haven't seen him since, and I don't know how he's doing today. But it's crazy to think about how easily something like that could have happened and nobody would have known for a long time. Luckily they caught him and I was able to come to terms with what happened and eventually forgive my dad for not telling us. I'm fine now, but it's not easy to talk about something like that.<br><br>**