hello, everyone, i'm don lemon. it is the top of the hour and we want to be safe in the air, but at what price is the question today? because we're heading into a busy travel week, and there's a lot of talk this weekend about the newly aggressive patdown searches at the nation's airports. they're being called embarrassing, invasive. one incident makes you wonder if the whole airport security thing has gone too far. it happened to a flight attendant and she's now taken her story public and it's adding fuel to the growing public outrage here. here's molly graham of our

charlotte affiliate. >> to have somebody's hands touching your body parts. >> reporter: cathy was asked to go through a body scanner on her way to work. they were just being rolled out in charlotte. from there, she was told to go into a private room with two female tsa agents. when one of them started touching her, cathy asked why she, a us airways flight attendant just trying to get to work, was being given such treatment. >> they told me that they had gotten a memo from the tsa saying flight crew members were the most obvious potential terrorists out there. >> reporter: thursday night, cathy told her story to wbtv. she says when the agent got to her right breast, where she had had surgery, she was told to show it to them. >> that's when i had to pull it out and show her the prosthesis.

which was very degrading. >> we did reach out to cathy bossy. she may be appearing on cnn later this evening and if she does, tune in here. let's turn to jacqui jeras. she's our meteorologist but she's been following the travel desk. you've been in the airports. can you imagine this poor lady and maybe others like her who have gone through similar circumstances? >> it would be a tough thing to go through. if you look at tsa's website, it will tell you that you shouldn't remove your prosthetic. so that is against the rules. my mom is a breast cancer survivor and it's a difficult thing to go through and tough to be reminded of that after you have healed. so to go through something like this is very unfortunate. >> you offered a good suggestion. there are lists for people who have certain devices and maybe this should be one of them.

>> yeah. if you have -- some people have metal devices in their body like a knee or hip replacement. maybe we could come up with a policy with a card that says hey, i've been identified as having a prosthetic and maybe they would be a little more understanding. >> thank you for providing personal perspective on this, jacqui jeras. jacqui is manning our travel desk today, which we'll have throughout the holidays. jacqui jeras, thank you. we want to go to our kate bolduan at washington's reagan national airport and says the tsa is aware of this woman's complaint. so what is their explanation? >> reporter: tsa released a short statement, don, and said in their statement "we will review the matter and take appropriate action, if necessary. tsa also pointed us to their procedures and policies regarding screening -- screening of prosthetic devices which say very clearly that the screening officers will need to see and touch the devices.

but it also says the officers will not ask nor require that you remove the diseases. so it seems clear it's not policy to ask someone to remove the device. but this did happen a couple months ago, moments before the new mapatdown procedures put do place. >> thank you very much for that, kate. we want to go to wendy walsh, who is a psychologist and blogger. tell me, what is going on here? have we traded really all of our privacy for the promise of safety and security? does it have to go this far? >> sad to say, it does, don. i mean, we've now reached the sort of level of personal fear that the rest of the world has had to endure for many, many decades. we lived in a place in america here, thinking that we were untouchable until 9/11. i happen to -- speaking of these patdowns, i was traveling

internationally last year when the christmas day bombing attempt happened and they said everybody, every international flight is getting a full patdown, including my baby. they patted down my children. but there's another piece here we have to consider. do you know how many tsa employees didn't think they signed up for this? this woman was apologizing. she said i'm so sorry, but i have to. >> let's talk about your thing, your expertise in this, and that's psychology. what does this do to the woman who has to go through this or other people that feel they have been sexually molested or touched improperly when they go through the airport, what does this do to us? >> for part of our population, who are suffering from some kind of post traumatic stress disorder from an earlier sexual molestation, a rape, any kind of sexual abuse that could have happened in the life span, having someone touch them in an intimate way can bring up

feelings that are not comfortable by any means and bring anxiety and panic attacks and fear. sad to say we have to make these decisions for the whole population. i happen to like the patdowns, i'm fine with them touching by junk or junk next to it if there's junk next to it that can hurt my children. >> wendy, we get it. thank you so much. stick around, because we're going to be relying on you. so the days of growing up, meeting that special someone, is that gone? gone away? those days are happening much, much less now. more people think that marriage is becoming obsolete. what's going on? is it a potential for cheating? we're having a conversation here. and the pope and the condom. and condom use. the words from the pontiff that may signal a change in the catholic church's stance on birth control. make sure you join us on twitter or facebook or check out our blog. and we have our own page on

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the dress, the flowers, it's supposed to be the most romantic day of a new life together. but many people aren't buying that anymore. a new poll shows that nearly 4 in 10 people think marriage is becoming obsolete. but that same study shows 67% say they're still optimistic about the future of marriage and family in america. what does that mean? so what's with these conflicting views? let's bring back our dr. wendy walsh and bring in shenay hall, a former nfl wife, and she's the author of "why do i have to think like a man, how do think like a lady and still get the man." wendy, let's talk about this 4 in 10 number, is it a sign of

the times here? >> it is. i think the traditional marriage is slowly becoming extinct but it's giving way to something else. a lot of choices. the silver lining -- >> hold on, wendy. you said slowly becoming extinct. >> i think we're going back to something much more natural. our ancestors lived in communities where people were biologically connected and many generations helped raise children in almost a small tribe. many people had an interest in keeping those children healthy. the idea of taking a nuclear family, one man, one woman, having one be the provider and caregiver and fitting them in a home in the suburbs and leaving her isolated with the kids is not normal for our species. >> i'm watching shenay, you're shaking your head here. do you agree with that? >> i do, i do. i definitely think that just because of our foundation, our

moral grounds that we're building our families on is unstable. we're building families on quick sand, and it's not the same mentality if you mary this person and we stay this way forever. people change. people change spouses like underwear every day. so it's not going to have the same meaning in 2010 than it did in 1950. >> you're going to hear the religious folks saying marriage between a man and woman, you have to have the nuclear family, you're here to pro create. you're going against conventional wisdom here. >> we are, but i'm not making the rules or setting the rules, i'm just following what is going on in today's society. and at the end of the day, no matter what scenario we look at, marriages are ending in divorce, whether for adultery or financial reasons or whatever. it just doesn't have that same bond as it used to have.

>> dr. wendy, i want to go through a couple of these. let's talk about this. when you talk about potential reasons. some people say it's economy, you have the preacher telling people to get off of facebook because they're getting in touch with old flames from high school and college. there's a high divorce rate, easy access to pornography and it's like dating and sex takeout these days, so there's no room to have a real relationship here. dr. wendy? >> i think all these relate, don, to the biggest issue, is that mix matched expectations and the belief what we see on tv is how marriage should be. first of all, news flash to married people. sex doesn't stay totally hot for years and years on end while you're tired and raising small children. news flash. but at the same time, as religion and the law are becoming less instrumental in

keeping people together, we have to learn to self-regulate. in a recent study, the number one indicator of whether a couple will stay together or not is intellectual commitment. >> it's intellectual commitment, it's not the sex or how hot somebody is. listen, shenay and doctor, we have tony parker talking about his marriage and staying focused. this was before they announced they were getting a divorce. go ahead. >> i'm having great support from my teammates and coaches, and focus 100% on the spurs and try to win basketball games. >> so that was about team work. do we have that thing about him talking about marriage? so you hear about this -- shenay, i want to ask you about this. they have so many distractions. they have women throwing themselves at them. you can have, you know, i see my friends and we go out and women are throwing themselves.

it's so easy nowadays. >> it is, it is. but that's what we were talking about earlier. if you go into the nba or nfl or whatever job you may have, if you don't have any moral backing, if you don't say i'm not going to cheat on this person because i love her and because i made this commitment to her, then you're just entering into basically a verbal agreement that you're saying when i get tired of you or when this chick looks better than you comes along, i'm out or i'm going to have sex with her and we can still play husband and wife in the public eye. we like to make it just strictly athlete and it's not. i interview guys that work at tacos that cheat on their wives. so it's just the environment. >> that's going to have to be the last word. i wonder if marriage, is that's going to change with all these ladies who are seeing prince william getting married. >> whatever. >> that's a wedding, not a

marriage. >> oh, you guys are so cynical. besides, the wedding is for the lady any way. i don't know why he's there. it should just be her and her girlfriends taking pictures. >> thank you. up next, a young girl who went through absolute hell. we're talking about elizabeth smart, presumed to be dead, only to be found months later. what is coming out about this story that you never knew before? martin savidge is here.

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boy, it's hard to believe it's been almost eight years. in salt lake city, the trial over the kidnapping of elizabeth

smart has transfixed much of the country. the level of abuse she endured was beyond horrifying, it is unspeakable. her story is the subject of a special presentation tonight right here on cnn. here's martin savidge to take us back to the day when the young girl many people assumed was dead turned up alive. >> reporter: it had been nine months since elizabeth smart disappeared from her home, when police finally got a break. just days after brian mitchell's photos appeared on "america's most wanted" police received two 911 calls. the callers said they had seen mitchell on this street, and he had been walking with a woman and a girl. police found mitchell and his wife, and a girl wearing a gray wig and sunglasses. at first she denied her identity, but police knew it was elizabeth.

>> and everett calls me and says tom, they've called me and asked me to come out to the police station, and he's in the car driving out there as fast as he can. and i told him, i said ed, i think you're going to go see your daughter. and then edward calls me, and says -- and he's just in tears, and he says, it's her, don. thank you. >> reporter: it was the moment they had hoped for all those months. but never knew would come. >> and i'm so grateful for the prayers and the help and the eyes out there. it is just absolutely wonderful. >> reporter: ed called john walsh and asked him to come to utah. >> all the brothers were there and all the kids and when she walked down those stairs, that was incredible. that was probably the best day i've spent on this show.

>> we all know what he went through. can you imagine as a parent what those people went through? i know she suffered, but the entire family. >> that's part of the reason why we begin with the day she was abducted. think in the eight years that's transpired people have forgotten how remarkable this story is. she's taken in the middle of the night, sleeping in her own little bed, her little sister next to her. she's taken away, weeks go by, then months. 99% of the outcomes are tragic and she's found alive and well. even the most jaded reporter found joyful on the day she was found. >> so now sadly it's good she's alive but we're learning about what happened to her in captivity and what will you tell us about that? >> this is also what we bring up. sure, she was taken. for many years, the family protected her and she did not speak publicly. now she's at the trial for the man accused of kidnapping her.

she is talking of the abuses that she had to suffer on a daily basis. and it is just staggering. the rapes that she went through, how alcohol allegedly was forced upon her. the things that she was made to go. remember, she was a 14-year-old child. >> how is she doing? >> remarkably well. that's the greatest miracle, to see this young girl with such strength, get up there with such composure on the stand and talk of these things. and now she's telling the world and doing it from the point of view that i am going to find justice and i will get it for myself. it's a very moving story. >> i can't wait to see it. so good to work with you here as we did at nbc. thank you. make sure you tune in this evening tonight at 10:00, our special report "taken: the kidnapping of elizabeth smart"

tonight at 10:00 p.m. eastern. it replays tonight at 10:30 tomorrow night i should say. tonight at 10:00, tomorrow night at 10:30. a big decision about the future of u.s. troops in afghanistan. the announcement just made in portugal. that is straight ahead. also, dr. sanjay gupta introduces us to a prominent doctor whose experiences as a patient led to him making big changes with his hospital. fiber one chewy bar. how'd you do that? do what? you made it taste like chocolate. it has 35% of your daily value of fiber. tasty fiber, that's a good one! ok, umm...read her mind. [ male announcer ] fiber one chewy bars. took some foolish risks as a teenager. but i was still taking a foolish risk with my cholesterol. anyone with high cholesterol may be at increased risk of heart attack.

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a cardiologist and a ceo of a major hospital, paralyzed in the prime of his life. as our dr. sanjay gupta shows us now, in his darkest moment, this ceo learned the importance of compassion in caring for patients. >> reporter: medicine has always been his passion. a cardiologist and ceo of the university of rochester medical center. berk was known as a real go-getter. but that changed in 2009. when he had a bicycle accident. >> i quickly noticed i couldn't feel my legs or left arm and i

moved my right arm and suddenly it couldn't move. >> reporter: he had broken his spine and was paralyzed from the neck down. >> i knew when he said, i'm so sorry, that he had a pretty good sense of how our lives were going to change. >> reporter: he spent 12 days in the icu of his own hospital. and there he began to see the importance of compassion in patient care. on a ventlator, unable to communicate, he knew the technology was keeping him alive, but it was his family and staff that made his life worth living. something as friendly as a nurse washing his hair. >> what she didn't know is the only part of my body that could feel sensation normally was my head. >> reporter: in less than a year, he was able to return to the hospital he loved as ceo.

but he was different. >> i really came to realize how critically important what i call compassion and attentiveness are, both for provider satisfaction, patient satisfaction, and driving quality and safety. >> reporter: he instituted the patient and family center care initiative, designed to improve patient care and the employee work environment. >> it's about valuing and respecting everyone. >> reporter: today, he works with a therapist to help him work, even though he can't feel his steps. he's promised himself to live as normal a life as possible. >> courage is not the roar you make when you go into battle, but the quiet voice that helps you get up every day and try again. >> reporter: dr. sanjay gupta, cnn, reporting. in the headlines right now, the u.s. remains committed to reducing american forces in afghanistan beginning in july. that worday