01-19-2016, 02:02 PM
When I first started to read this I wasn't quite sure where it was leading however it was a great eye opener on why training is so important. Remember it is everyone's personal responsibility to have self defense training.
Personal Responsibility Trumps Everything
by Tammy | Nov 4, 2015
http://womencarry.com/personal-responsib...verything/
Yesterday was the day I had to use my training.
My 4-year-old grandson jumped/fell out of a second-story bedroom window.
As I ran down the stairs after my five-year-old told me this fact, my ten-year-old walked in the front door carrying him. My ten-year-old didn’t know not to move him. My heart was in my throat as I registered the potential consequences of this action.
In a previous life, I’m a midwife so I have advanced first aid training. I quickly assessed the situation, My grandson wasn’t breathing properly, his eyes were rolled back in his head, his coloring was BAD. I laid him on the floor, I assessed his airway and removed gum from his mouth, he started breathing normally as I laid him flat and stabilized his neck. I got my older children to call 911 and get me a blanket, meanwhile my grandson started fighting me.
My heart sank.
Posturing is a sign of a brain injury.
I thought I was watching my grandson die… or worse.
Slowly his eyes came back to center and he started to focus. Next he started screaming for his mom. He was still fighting me as I held his neck, but I knew this wasn’t posturing. I talked my 16 yr old through holding his head while I assessed the rest of his body. He was complaining that his arm and head hurt. Everything else appeared to be fine.
It took 30 minutes for the ambulance to arrive.
Thirty LONG minutes while I did what I could to make him comfortable and keep him from possibly doing more damage to himself. I understood the effects adrenaline was having on my children and myself. I was hyper focused experiencing both tunnel vision and slow motion time.
Other phone calls had to be made. I talked one son through the information the 911 operator needed while talking another through calling my husband and my daughter. How do you tell your daughter something like this has happened?
Looking back, I’m sure there were things I said and or did that I don’t remember clearly today. Bottom line, the paramedics arrived, got him on a board just as my daughter arrived. I followed them to the hospital.
What does this have to do with handgun training and/or Women Carry?
I had been having serious misgivings about the time Women Carry was taking from my family and in a moment of perfect clarity while holding my grandson’s head and seeing his blue eyes fixed and rolled up in his head I knew I had been wasting precious time on something that wasn’t my responsibility.
Here’s the thing.
No one can give you what you need to know. You have to want it bad enough to make the effort, the sacrifice, to get it for yourself. I was able to remain calm, assess, and stabilize my grandson because I had taken the time to learn that skill to the point that it kicked in without a second thought. No panic, no hysteria, I just got to work and did what needed doing.
If or when you need self-defense skills no one else will be there to help you. It will either be something you spent enough time learning that it kicks in automatically or it won’t. It’s really that simple.
Help is likely to be minutes away.
While it’s nice to think that help is only a phone call away, that 911 operator can’t do what needs to be done for you. A civilian’s gun fight typically lasts no more than 3-5 seconds. That’s not even enough time to get 911 on the line!
Do you have those skills?
If not, get them. Take responsibility and do what it takes.
I have heard so many excuses for why someone can’t get the training they believe is necessary or carry a gun every day during the past few months running Women Carry. It’s sickening. It’s like people want to be victims instead of their own hero.
When my husband called my daughter to tell her about the accident, to calm her down he told her that I was the best person to have had this happen with. That he knew I was doing everything that could be done. That I had the skills and the training to handle this.
Can your spouse say that about you?
If not, fix it.
No excuses! No buts! Make the necessary sacrifices because you won’t get a do-over. There are no fresh targets to try again if you screw it up. This is life or death and it’s as real as it gets.
I believe we are doing women a huge disservice by providing feel good social gatherings around gun training. What I’m seeing and witnessing is that they get together and pat one another on the back for showing up instead of pushing one another to excellence. They say they prefer to shoot with other women because they are intimidated by men or the men make them feel bad about their performance. Even worse, they repeat the lie that everyone needs to work at their own pace, be on their own journey, etc, etc
SUCK IT UP!
This isn’t a social exercise, it’s training to defend your life. If your performance sucks, get better. Don’t run away crying for heaven’s sake! That crappy target you’re so proud of shows me that you don’t have the skills to save your life… or that of your children. It just doesn’t take that much, once you’re committed, to become proficient with a gun.
I have given you all you need to know…
On this website you will find:
•how to choose a gun
•reviews and comments from highly qualified instructors on different guns
•what makes a good holster
•5 holsters that will work with 99% of your wardrobe
•how to choose a good instructor
•a list of instructors you can travel to or ask to come to you
Everything else is up to you.
Sure you can hang out in online groups and listen to advice from other people just like you that don’t really know what they’re talking about. They seem to like to hear the sound of their own voice. Warning, from what I’ve seen 90% of it is BAD advice. You can look at other people’s targets and think yours isn’t so bad. You can go to your monthly social gathering and talk about how nice it is to shoot with other women because they aren’t so competitive or pushy.
But guess what? Pigs don’t know pigs stink!
Don’t hang out with people who shoot just like you! Hang out with people who are 100x better than you! People who can’t shoot better than you also can’t teach you to be better. And who do you really want to be like? Don’t settle for someone who has only taken an NRA instructor development class and a women’s overview class.
Here’s a dirty little secret… Women don’t need to learn how to shoot from other women. It’s a marketing ploy and the companies utilizing it are making millions off of you! The skills you need to learn, aren’t so different coming from a man than a woman. We don’t need special kid gloves to receive it.
Men can teach you just as well or better than your local lady instructor. Sure maybe they don’t talk about what to do if you have boobs or hips, but that kind of information is easy to figure out yourself or come by on the internet. And it’s most certainly not essential enough that you can’t learn how to run a gun from a man. (I’ve posted good resources in the sidebar of this blog for this kind of information)
I am a good shooter. I have had fantastic training and it has mostly come from men. As a matter of fact, not until I was already instructing did I take a class from a woman. I am the mother of ten children, I live in Alaska and had to travel on an airplane to get 90% of the training I needed – and no, I’m not independently wealthy. Don’t drink the Koolaid and believe somehow you need something special and different.
Make a sacrifice! Give up dinners out, Starbucks, and a few Christmas presents for your kids (who probably already have more than they need) and get a gun that fits your hand, a holster that is safe and reliable, and invest in some good classes that teach you gun safety, how to draw and shoot from concealment, and about the laws of self-defense. That is a minimum of three shooting classes and I would recommend taking more, at least yearly if not every six months until you know that those skills are ingrained and automatic.
Because life is short, and we don’t get to choose when we’re going to need our training.
PS – My grandson has no broken bones, his CT scan was clear, and he was watched overnight at our local Children’s Hospital. Today he’s meeting with brain trauma specialists to see if there’s anything that has been missed. He’s got a mighty fine headache and some bruises but appears to be ok.
Because of this accident and my clarity of thought, I will returning to my original vision for this website. I have closed our FB community, and will be focusing on my family, GunStart (the training company I run with my husband), and matters closer to my heart for a season. I am taking responsibility for my life, I invite you to take responsibility for yours. I will return soon with a new direction and vision for this site.
Personal Responsibility Trumps Everything
by Tammy | Nov 4, 2015
http://womencarry.com/personal-responsib...verything/
Yesterday was the day I had to use my training.
My 4-year-old grandson jumped/fell out of a second-story bedroom window.
As I ran down the stairs after my five-year-old told me this fact, my ten-year-old walked in the front door carrying him. My ten-year-old didn’t know not to move him. My heart was in my throat as I registered the potential consequences of this action.
In a previous life, I’m a midwife so I have advanced first aid training. I quickly assessed the situation, My grandson wasn’t breathing properly, his eyes were rolled back in his head, his coloring was BAD. I laid him on the floor, I assessed his airway and removed gum from his mouth, he started breathing normally as I laid him flat and stabilized his neck. I got my older children to call 911 and get me a blanket, meanwhile my grandson started fighting me.
My heart sank.
Posturing is a sign of a brain injury.
I thought I was watching my grandson die… or worse.
Slowly his eyes came back to center and he started to focus. Next he started screaming for his mom. He was still fighting me as I held his neck, but I knew this wasn’t posturing. I talked my 16 yr old through holding his head while I assessed the rest of his body. He was complaining that his arm and head hurt. Everything else appeared to be fine.
It took 30 minutes for the ambulance to arrive.
Thirty LONG minutes while I did what I could to make him comfortable and keep him from possibly doing more damage to himself. I understood the effects adrenaline was having on my children and myself. I was hyper focused experiencing both tunnel vision and slow motion time.
Other phone calls had to be made. I talked one son through the information the 911 operator needed while talking another through calling my husband and my daughter. How do you tell your daughter something like this has happened?
Looking back, I’m sure there were things I said and or did that I don’t remember clearly today. Bottom line, the paramedics arrived, got him on a board just as my daughter arrived. I followed them to the hospital.
What does this have to do with handgun training and/or Women Carry?
I had been having serious misgivings about the time Women Carry was taking from my family and in a moment of perfect clarity while holding my grandson’s head and seeing his blue eyes fixed and rolled up in his head I knew I had been wasting precious time on something that wasn’t my responsibility.
Here’s the thing.
No one can give you what you need to know. You have to want it bad enough to make the effort, the sacrifice, to get it for yourself. I was able to remain calm, assess, and stabilize my grandson because I had taken the time to learn that skill to the point that it kicked in without a second thought. No panic, no hysteria, I just got to work and did what needed doing.
If or when you need self-defense skills no one else will be there to help you. It will either be something you spent enough time learning that it kicks in automatically or it won’t. It’s really that simple.
Help is likely to be minutes away.
While it’s nice to think that help is only a phone call away, that 911 operator can’t do what needs to be done for you. A civilian’s gun fight typically lasts no more than 3-5 seconds. That’s not even enough time to get 911 on the line!
Do you have those skills?
If not, get them. Take responsibility and do what it takes.
I have heard so many excuses for why someone can’t get the training they believe is necessary or carry a gun every day during the past few months running Women Carry. It’s sickening. It’s like people want to be victims instead of their own hero.
When my husband called my daughter to tell her about the accident, to calm her down he told her that I was the best person to have had this happen with. That he knew I was doing everything that could be done. That I had the skills and the training to handle this.
Can your spouse say that about you?
If not, fix it.
No excuses! No buts! Make the necessary sacrifices because you won’t get a do-over. There are no fresh targets to try again if you screw it up. This is life or death and it’s as real as it gets.
I believe we are doing women a huge disservice by providing feel good social gatherings around gun training. What I’m seeing and witnessing is that they get together and pat one another on the back for showing up instead of pushing one another to excellence. They say they prefer to shoot with other women because they are intimidated by men or the men make them feel bad about their performance. Even worse, they repeat the lie that everyone needs to work at their own pace, be on their own journey, etc, etc
SUCK IT UP!
This isn’t a social exercise, it’s training to defend your life. If your performance sucks, get better. Don’t run away crying for heaven’s sake! That crappy target you’re so proud of shows me that you don’t have the skills to save your life… or that of your children. It just doesn’t take that much, once you’re committed, to become proficient with a gun.
I have given you all you need to know…
On this website you will find:
•how to choose a gun
•reviews and comments from highly qualified instructors on different guns
•what makes a good holster
•5 holsters that will work with 99% of your wardrobe
•how to choose a good instructor
•a list of instructors you can travel to or ask to come to you
Everything else is up to you.
Sure you can hang out in online groups and listen to advice from other people just like you that don’t really know what they’re talking about. They seem to like to hear the sound of their own voice. Warning, from what I’ve seen 90% of it is BAD advice. You can look at other people’s targets and think yours isn’t so bad. You can go to your monthly social gathering and talk about how nice it is to shoot with other women because they aren’t so competitive or pushy.
But guess what? Pigs don’t know pigs stink!
Don’t hang out with people who shoot just like you! Hang out with people who are 100x better than you! People who can’t shoot better than you also can’t teach you to be better. And who do you really want to be like? Don’t settle for someone who has only taken an NRA instructor development class and a women’s overview class.
Here’s a dirty little secret… Women don’t need to learn how to shoot from other women. It’s a marketing ploy and the companies utilizing it are making millions off of you! The skills you need to learn, aren’t so different coming from a man than a woman. We don’t need special kid gloves to receive it.
Men can teach you just as well or better than your local lady instructor. Sure maybe they don’t talk about what to do if you have boobs or hips, but that kind of information is easy to figure out yourself or come by on the internet. And it’s most certainly not essential enough that you can’t learn how to run a gun from a man. (I’ve posted good resources in the sidebar of this blog for this kind of information)
I am a good shooter. I have had fantastic training and it has mostly come from men. As a matter of fact, not until I was already instructing did I take a class from a woman. I am the mother of ten children, I live in Alaska and had to travel on an airplane to get 90% of the training I needed – and no, I’m not independently wealthy. Don’t drink the Koolaid and believe somehow you need something special and different.
Make a sacrifice! Give up dinners out, Starbucks, and a few Christmas presents for your kids (who probably already have more than they need) and get a gun that fits your hand, a holster that is safe and reliable, and invest in some good classes that teach you gun safety, how to draw and shoot from concealment, and about the laws of self-defense. That is a minimum of three shooting classes and I would recommend taking more, at least yearly if not every six months until you know that those skills are ingrained and automatic.
Because life is short, and we don’t get to choose when we’re going to need our training.
PS – My grandson has no broken bones, his CT scan was clear, and he was watched overnight at our local Children’s Hospital. Today he’s meeting with brain trauma specialists to see if there’s anything that has been missed. He’s got a mighty fine headache and some bruises but appears to be ok.
Because of this accident and my clarity of thought, I will returning to my original vision for this website. I have closed our FB community, and will be focusing on my family, GunStart (the training company I run with my husband), and matters closer to my heart for a season. I am taking responsibility for my life, I invite you to take responsibility for yours. I will return soon with a new direction and vision for this site.
