California, Sep 29 (THAINDIAN News) Elizabeth Smart spoke at a women’s conference in California about her kidnapping ordeal and how she overcame her trauma. “I just have never let it hold me back,” she told the audience at a seminar entitled Overcoming the Unimaginable.

“And I have gone on to do everything so far that I have wanted to do … I think that’s so important. We all have our trials and we all experience hard times but I don’t think that we should ever let it disable us from doing what we want to do.”

Elizabeth Smart said that her family and faith got her through the dark days of her abduction and its aftermath. “I know that we do have angels on the other side of what we don’t see,” she said. “We’re never truly left alone in our darkest hour.”

Elizabeth was just 14 years old when she was taken from her bed in Salt Lake City, Utah, in June 2002. Then she was chained to a tree, drugged and raped almost daily by her kidnapper, who was later, charged with abducting her, Brian David Mitchell.

She was rescued in March 2003 after someone spotted her walking with Mitchell and a woman, Wanda Ileen Barzee.