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Kill or be killed: a climber’s dilemma, part 2

Beth Rodden escaped her kidnappers in the Kyrgyz mountains, and climbed harder than ever trying to push the trauma down, but she couldn’t hide from it forever.

Beth Rodden escaped her kidnappers, and pushed her body to its limit, following the climber code of whatever hurts makes you stronger. She married her boyfriend Tommy Caldwell, who had saved them by pushing their captor off a cliff in the Kyrgyz mountains. They became the first couple to free climb the Nose in Yosemite National Park. To the world she was a record-breaking athlete, but inside she was crumbling, haunted by that moment in the mountains. It would take her 15 years to face it head on, and in doing so she redefined what it meant to be a climber.

Beth's book A Light Through the Cracks: A Climber's Story is out now.

Clips are from NPR and the Associated Press.

Presenter: Emily Webb
Producer: Louise Morris

Get in touch: liveslessordinary@bbc.co.uk or WhatsApp: 0044 330 678 2784

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