Exactly. And it was continuously reinforced when no one recognized him - and when a few did, but didn't do anything about it, he felt all alone.
I'm kind of wondering now if the Shawn Devlin is a dissociative persona his mind invented for protection (obviously used by his captor first).
He could tell himself he was play-acting then, but at night when he prayed to God that his parents would find him, he was Shawn Hornbeck.
It reminds me of Miss America Marilyn Vanderbur's story - she was *good child* by day and *bad child* by night when her father was assaulting her. "Day child/night child" she called it.
This statement of yours is probably so true and so very sad. Shawn needs our prayers and not our judgement. The pedophile who stole him is the one that needs our justified wrath.