Like, I hope, millions of others, I sat glued to my TV last night, watching the Jaycee Dugard interview on ABC. I actually rushed home from church and bought a frozen dinner (instead of cooking) so I could watch it.

I’ve periodically wondered how she is doing ever since she was discovered in 2009 after having been missing for 18 years. I understood her need for privacy (refusing to buy any of the magazines that claimed to have the scoop), but I still wondered. Almost exactly six months older than me, her story hit me deeply. I couldn’t imagine missing the 18 keys years of life — junior high, high school, college… marriage. And to have given birth… TWICE… in a backyard…. at such a young age! My heart ached for her, and I prayed she’d find peace and be able to make a life today for herself.

The few clips I saw leading up to the special showed me a strong woman, and I was already inspired by her.

So when I sat down with my bowl of microwaved jambalaya and a glass of wine, I wasn’t watching out of any weird morbid curiosity. I watched to be inspired more…

And I WAS.

What I watched was one of the strongest most amazing women I’ve ever seen. We look up to actresses and singers, etc. but its people like Jaycee that we need to look up to and be inspired by. Having gone through such a horrible ordeal, she faces her story head-on and hopes it’ll help others who have been victims of rape and kidnapping. She has been through a lot, but there was a peace on her face. She spoke of hope and living every single day to its fullest.

Her relationship with her mother made me so happy, and I got teary at times watching them interact. She speaks of her daughters — girls she gave birth to after becoming pregnant at the hands of her captor — with a deep mother’s love of her own. If she finds her “soul mate” and some day gets married, that’s great. But she’s happy in her life as it is.

She’s happy.

And THAT is what I so hoped to see. More than anything, I hoped to see a happy woman.

I’m going to try to pick up her book (A Stolen Life: A Memoir) soon. I want to read more of her strong, positive and inspiring words. Learn more about how she coped through it all. And I’ll read it knowing it is the words of a woman I officially look up to and admire. I pray I never go through anything like what she went through — NO ONE should go through that — but, more, I pray that in any trial thrown at me in life, I will handle it with even a little bit of the strength she has shown to have.