From the Survival
Blog
The biggest weakness
in preparedness planning is not a forgotten survival item,
or too few cartridges. The invisible weakness is lack of real
time experience It's one thing to say your going to raise your
own food, and maybe you have all the seeds and tools to do it stored away.
But if you have never actually planted a huge garden and tried to live
off it your first year is going to be full of failures (see: learning
opportunities) that could be potentially deadly in real survival time. The
same goes for every aspect of survival and emergency situation response.
Personally I have always wondered how I would react in a real SHTF situation. Would I freeze?
React too slowly? Freak out?
Police agencies recommend that you
think out potential dangerous situations frequently and plan how you
would react. Such as an intruder in your house, or someone trying to
break through the door. This helps when you actually are confronted by
the situation. My husband and I have talked about what we would do, and
even discussed it to a certain extent with out daughter who is 15 so she can be
safe and help keep her younger siblings safe while we deal with the situation. She
often complained about it because we have always lived in the country or in
small rural towns. I have tried to tell her that drugs are still just as
much a problem in these kind of communities, but like most people, she thought
that if you live in a small community is must be safer. Most people do
not realize that while the population is small, the statistical drug abuse
rates and alcohol rates are as high or higher than large cities.
As a woman moreover, my concern is
how I would react and effectively defend myself against a man coming
onto my property or into my home and threatening me and my children while I'm
alone. I am a home-maker so I am alone with the children most
of every day. This is one reason I keep firearms as protection.
Guns have been called The Great Equalizer and for women this
is especially true. I know that when it comes to a confrontation with a
man I am not going to win. Men are bigger and stronger and no Politically
Correct foolishness is going to change that fact. My father stressed that
women should know how to handle guns and carry one because violent crimes
against woman are common. He taught his daughters how to use all styles
of firearms with proficiency and safety so while I wish that I lived in the
world of puppies and rainbows I see the necessity to posses guns.
Yesterday morning started out just
like normal. I was making breakfast for my four children and drinking a
cup of coffee. Everything was fine and dandy when suddenly my four year
old son said "Mommy a man just walked through our side yard!" I
was surprised and concerned since it was 7:00 in the morning and nobody should
be in our yard. I called to my husband, who was luckily still home.
If it had been 15 minutes later he would have been gone. I told my
husband what our four year old had said and after asking which way the man had
gone, which was towards the back yard, he went out to take a look.
While all this was happening our
amazing guard dog golden retriever was snoring gently in corner! My
husband first looked out that back window and sure enough a man was out at our
chicken run. He let me know that and then walked out to talk to the man.
Almost instantly he was back in the house.
"Lock the doors and call 911, he
said, this guys is off his rocker" The man was at that time trying
to pull down our chicken fence and when my husband asked him what he was doing
he said "This is a mirror and it must come down". He had no
slurred speech and was walking just fine but my husband said the way he looked
was extremely creepy. The man was obviously on some sort of drugs or in
the grips of a psychotic episode.
My first thought was bath salts or
spice, as both of those have been in the news a lot. People in the grips
of these drugs are extremely dangerous as it can cause violent psychosis to the
point where they strip off their clothes and attack people. There have
been constant and increasing reports across the country of people on these
drugs not just attacking but also trying to eat other people! They do not
respond to pain and have unnatural strength.
Needless to say neither my husband or
I wanted to get into a physical altercation with this man. My husband
monitored him through a window while I immediately got the children upstairs
and into a secure room. Our back door is very unsecure, I could probably
break through it with one kick so I was concerned what would happen if this man
tried to come in. I also considered that this man may be armed and wanted
my children as far away from flying bullets with as many walls between them as
possible. This took about 20 seconds and then I was calling 911. I
felt no fear or panic, just an eerie calm with very clear thinking. Every
thought of mine was to keep my children safe and remove the threat from
my family. As soon as I got to the phone my husband went and got the pump
action shotgun loaded with slugs. He stood by the window and continued to
watch the man and report what he was doing so I could then tell the 911
operator.
After trying to rip down the fence
the man was now hitting his head repeatedly against it. I told the
operator to warn the responding officers that the man appeared to be
hallucinating. Now my husband told me the man was shaking and twitching
and had again switched to trying to tear the fence down.
Within four minutes of the initial
911 call the officers were on our property, which is one of the great things
about living in a small town. As soon as they arrived and had engaged in
conversation with the man my husband went and put the shotgun away. No
need to get into an uncomfortable discussion on our firearms.
The man went with the officers with
no struggle thank goodness and we then gave our statements. Apparently
the man had been causing trouble all night but since the previous people had
not wanted to press charges he was allowed to walk. We pressed charges
for trespassing simply because the man otherwise would have been let go to
terrorize some other family. In jail he would be evaluated and not let go
till he sobered up off of whatever he had taken.
All in all I think we handled the
situation just right with only a few mistakes. The first mistake was my
husband going out and confronting the man without any defensive weapons.
Due to the fact that people hyped up on street drugs are often impervious
to pain and display extreme strength this could have been really bad if the guy
had gone after my husband. My husband is very physically fit and strong.
He also is pretty confident on handling dangerous situations, but if
taken by the element of surprise he could have been overpowered before he could
react. I of course would have gotten the shotgun immediately and dealt
with the situation but my husband would have been injured.
Also I should have been armed as
well. That way if the guy had gotten through my husband and the
shotgun he wouldn't have gotten through me.
The after-effects of this
incident were what you would expect. There was much soothing needed for
my children, and we had to explain why the man was acting the way he did.
That night both me and my husband had a hard time sleeping. Also my
husband came up and hugged me right after the police left. We had been
having an ongoing marital debate about locked doors. I always keep the
doors double locked even though we live in a small town and this annoyed my
husband when he would come home at night. My statement every night was
the same. "I don't want anyone able to just walk into my
house!" to which he would then blow off as unnecessary paranoia.
After this incident however he told
me that if he ever gave me trouble about the locked doors again I was to punch
him in the face!
During this whole incident
I certainly felt concerned, but not panicked The
main reason for this was because both my husband and I are armed and know how
to use them. This man was not getting into our house.
This gave me a real calmness. I cannot imagine what I would have
felt like if we had not been armed and had to rely on nothing more than a
locked door to protect us. I have been teased often by anti gun family
members about my penchant for carrying defence weapons. But as I have
heard stated many times before you don't need a gun until you really need
a gun. And then if you don't have one you are screwed.
What really disturbed me was what
would have happened if one of my children had gone outside to feed the animals
like they usually do while that man was out there. They would
have tried talking to him not realizing he was unbalanced.
I definitely recommend
planning out what you would do in situations like these. It is so important to
think out your priorities and who does what in a crises. From
our previous discussions it helped us spring to action and not panic.
As a last note we are this very
weekend re-enforcing our back door so that it will take more than a hard tug to
get through it.
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