Jessica Buchanan
Benefitting the Hostage US
She was being kidnapped. It took a while for that reality to set in. As an aid worker in Somalia, Jessica Buchanan was not supposed to be a target, but there was a lot of clan fighting in the southern part of the country, resources were scarce, and ransom demands could be sky high. What does it take to survive being held hostage under the worst imaginable conditions for weeks that turn into months? Jessica shares how to be the hero of your story and use any life-defining moment to show you what you’re made of.
In This Episode, We talk about:
Her moment of self-abandonment.
Being abducted by Somali Pirates in October 2011.
The routine and days of being a prisoner.
How her mom, who passed just before the kidnapping, was able to help her.
Being rescued by SEAL Team Six and her reintegration process.
Life after she returned home and how she’s using this experience to build community.
Wise Words
I did as any newlywed wife would do, I hopped on a UN plane and followed him up to Somalia and made my new life there.
But then the third time it was scheduled, I called my colleague Poul, who was a Danish gentleman who was running the field office where I was supposed to be going in southern Somalia. I said, “I don't want to go. I feel like it's not safe.” He was living down there. He was basically like, “Look, if you don't get down here and do your job, I'm going to report you to our supervisor.”
I look at myself in the mirror, and I said out loud to myself, “Jess, do you want to do this?” And I knew the answer was no.
My subconscious, my gut knew so deeply and so strongly that my life was about to change, and not in a good way.
Then he gets in next to me and puts a gun to my head and started screaming at the driver to drive in English. We just take off through town. Poul's in the front seat, in the passenger side. We drive for 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes. I actually can't think anything other than “this is so bad.” Whatever this is, whatever is happening right now is so bad that I don't even have any frame of reference. I don't have anything to compare this to. My mind was just like freaking out.
I will never forget just this look of like pity on his face because he understands that I haven't comprehended what's happening yet. He just says, “We're being kidnapped.” And I'm just like, I think I'm going to have a panic attack, I think I'm going to start hyperventilating. Like what? I don't know what that means. I'm a school teacher from Ohio. I don't know what it means to be kidnapped by armed gunman in Somalia. That is not something I have ever prepared myself for.
I keep thinking like if we're not driving south then that means I have a chance, because if they're driving south, that means we're going to Mogadishu and Al Shabaab, Islamic terrorist groups, rural Mogadishu. I'm an American woman; I will be raped and beheaded on international television if that's the case.
I remember feeling blood trickle down the front of my leg and I'm thinking, “Okay, this is good. This is good. I'm still alive. I'm still alive because I can feel pain.”
And so, I don't know, maybe we walk 20, 30 minutes, and then they tell us to get down on our knees. I'm just thinking some of the most bizarre things. I wonder if it's going to hurt. I wonder how long it takes to die.
I wasn't going anywhere, but I was going to have to go somewhere in my mind, otherwise I was going to go insane.
What I found was that even if I didn't get to experience anything else, and I died out there, I had had an extraordinary 32 years. I had been loved. I had been cared for. I had been treasured. I had been hurt. I'd been abused. I'd been confused.
we always have a choice, even in the most impossible circumstances when it feels like you don't.
I can say that I believe that if we don't continue to try to make things more equitable for everyone in the world, things like this are going to keep happening.
As I'm mentally processing how I'm not going to be able to survive another kidnapping, I hear the voice of just this young American man. He reminds me of my brother, really. And he knows my name. He says, “Jessica, we’re the American military. You're safe now. We're going to take you home.”
Just the events that have unfolded, like finding out that President Obama is the one who actually called my father to let him know that I had survived and that I had been rescued by SEAL Team Six and I was coming home. I mean, it's just been like mind-blowing.
There are no words to express how lucky I am, but I think that, especially in this day and age where we feel so conflicted and maybe things are so polarized, it does mean something to belong to a country that will go to such lengths and expend every resource available to bring back one, just one. That just doesn't happen anywhere else.
I'm a big believer that if you need medication to get you out of the valley, there is no stigma, there is no shame. Take the medication.
I want to make a case for letting our hard stuff define us, because I think it absolutely does. It shows us how inspiring and incredible we are.
I think a lot of times I told it as in I was the damsel in distress, and they came and rescued me. I think it was really in conversation with them that it was this realization, this a-ha moment of oh no, you know what, there gets to be more than one hero in this story. While they are absolutely heroes 150%, there may be room for me to be a hero in my own way in my own story. That was really empowering, and it has definitely changed the way I tell it and the way I move in it.
Building community is what I've learned has been a cornerstone to building resilience.
LINKS
Website: www.jessbuchanan.com
Instagram: @jessicacbuchanan
Podcast: We Should Talk About That
Coaching: Project You Collective
Book: Impossible Odds: The Kidnapping of Jessica Buchanan and Her Dramatic Rescue by SEAL Team Six
Charity Donation: Hostage US