The child is kidnapped by someone in the family or someone close to the family. These cases always made me feel easier in the sense that they most likely won't harm them. Of course it's incredibly screwed up that they'd do this in the first place, but to me, this 90% of the time sealed the deal that the child would turn up alive (compared to a complete stranger kidnapping them, which most of the time ended badly).

Did anyone else feel this way during the original run?

In the sense that it was highly unlikely they would be abusing the child sexually or physically yes. But not that they were messing them up mentally-like those grandparents who abducted the kids & had been telling them that their parents were devil worshipers etc & brainwashing them against them.

In the sense that it was highly unlikely they would be abusing the child sexually or physically yes. But not that they were messing them up mentally-like those grandparents who abducted the kids & had been telling them that their parents were devil worshipers etc & brainwashing them against them.

My favorite grandparents, the Baskins! Also, Elizabeth Ortiz and Jonathan Ortiz come to mind. That kid is fifty shades of effed up and I think his mother had a lot to do with it.