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SALT LAKE CITY — Elizabeth Smart's memoir, "My Story," comes out Monday. The book will focus on her experience of being kidnapped and held for nine months by Brian David Mitchell and Wanda Barzee.
[An NBC News special also aired Friday at 9 p.m.](<http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/10/04/20807538-whatever-it-took-to-survive-elizabeth-smart-reveals-how-she-coped-in-captivity?lite > >) and Smart spoke with Meredith Vieira about her experience.
Smart was very candid about her kidnapping in the NBC special. She went into specific detail about what happened to her, beginning with the night she was kidnapped from her home, and the days and months after until she was finally released.
"Being raped every day, not knowing when I'd be able to eat next, not knowing when I'd be able to drink next, and being chained to a tree, I didn't feel human," Smart told Vieira.
"What a survivor she is, to have gone through that 9-month ordeal and make that decision as a 14-year- old that 'I am going to survive this,' " Vieira said.
Smart took Vieira up to the camp on the mountainside where Mitchell and Barzee first held Smart captive. When Smart first arrived at the camp, Barzee took her into a tent and ordered her to undress.
"Then she left me alone, sitting on the bucket in the tent, crying, waiting for I didn't know what," Smart said.
Smart was then raped and chained to a tree like an animal.
Smart has moved on from this trauma, and says she's not haunted by the events.
"It was creepy to me, but (Smart) was very calm there," Vieira said. "She said, 'You know, I have nothing against this place. This place didn't hurt me, these people hurt me.' "
Smart has moved on from the trauma of the experience, and said she's not haunted by the events. She got married, formed the Elizabeth Smart Foundation to help prevent crimes against children and travels the country speaking on the topic.
"(Smart) wants (the survivors she speaks with) to know that a) they're not alone — that's why she went into such detail that she did; and b) that you can experience something horrific and feel that you're shattered and never be put back together again, and yet, you can be made whole again," Vieira said.
The Meredith Vieira special airs Friday at 9 p.m. on KSL. Elizabeth Smart will appear on the Today show on Oct. 7, the day her memoir is released.
