No Winners

I just watched a story on Sunday Night about a girl who was 'kidnapped' by her mother 21 years ago and her mother had recently been put in jail. I have watched many stories on kidnapping in the last few years and they all seemed the same, this one was different.

There was claim of abuse from the father towards his daughter as a baby. The father claimed the mother was mentally ill, having had a mentally ill mother myself I can tell you right now that this intelligent, articulate girl was not raised by someone who is mentally ill.
The mother ran from America with her daughter and they eventually ended up in Australia. I don't know about anyone else but I would only do something like that - leave all my friends and family - and go to an unknown country with my child if I believed my child was in real danger.

I see a mother who did what parents are supposed to do - protect and love their child. Not everyone has that opinion. I read the Sunday Night facebook page comments on this story and people were divided about if she did the right thing or not. What made me angry was not that people were against the mother, everyone has a right to their opinion, but rather what some of the people had said about the mother. Noone knows what really happened so really cannot judge her. Sam, the daughter who was kidnapped could also read these comments and no one should see people saying nasty things about their parent, especially not strangers.
I wish Sam and her mother and father the best of luck for the future. There are no winners here, regardless of what intentions the parents had.