When You Hurt Yourself

I stole a second to actually browse the recommended videos YouTube had for me on my page today and was caught by the title of a video called, "I got stabbed:( and some sweet knife porn !!"
I wanted to hear the story of this one so I clicked on the video and started to watch.

If you would like to watch, here it is:

Before I go any further I would like to say that this isn't a blog to bash on this guy. To my knowledge I've never watched one of his videos before nor have I interacted with him. I really don't even know what his channel is about other than knives. So, all that being said, I have absolutely nothing against this guy.


To my knowledge he's neither stupid nor ignorant. He just happens to be someone who posted a video about his experience and I happened to come across it and thought it would make some great talking points. And so here we go..

He starts the video explaining about how he accidentally stabbed himself in the leg.

While working on a Spyderco Cat (with a 2.438 inch blade) he dropped the knife.

Some of you may remember this status update I posted in April:

He had lapse in judgment.

Again, he probably knew better. According to him, he's used to trying to catch screws and tools with his legs so his trained response upon dropping anything in his shop was to close his legs and catch said object in his lap.

What he caught was a 2.438" blade in the thigh. Hilt deep.

He then pulled the knife out, went upstairs, called his father-in-law, went to urgent care, got ten stitches (five internal and five external) and lived to make a video about it.

My first point should be pretty obvious.

1. Don't try to catch knives or guns. Or get in habits that would condition you to do so.

Really and truly! Sometimes those of us who work with guns and knives get a little complacent. We get so used to handling them that we take them for granted. We do silly things with them and while we may not break any specific rules we may think we are above being extra cautious. It can happen to anyone of us and it's a credit to the responsible people in the gun/knife communities that it doesn't happen as often as you'd think.

This individual trained himself over and over and over again to catch falling things with his legs. When he dropped a knife he did what he trained himself to do. I suspect that conditioning will stop after this and he will find a way to capture falling screws and tools without assistance from his thighs.

2. Have some medical knowledge and think before you act. 

I'll admit. The EMT in me was just about having a fit when he said he pulled the knife out and THEN ran upstairs to call his father-in-law and get help. She was screaming, "You NEVER remove a penetrating object!"

But the regular gal in me shrugs and says, "Shut up! You would have done the same thing and you know it!"

The negotiator between the two sides says, "Now girls, stop fighting! We all know that she would have assessed the wound and made an educated decision as to whether it was wise to remove the knife or not."

I don't know how much the author of the video knows about knife wounds, treating them and so on. I don't know what kind of assessment, if any, he gave himself before pulling the knife out. I won't speculate. I only know that my first reaction is to say that pulling out the knife was a dumb thing to do. There's a lot of vital stuff running through the thigh and many times the impaled object acts as a plug to the wound and keeps lots of blood from being lost. That's the textbook EMT talking.

The practical individual in me says that as long as I was able to look at the wound, where it was located and the vitality thereof, a razor-sharp knife in my own thigh would probably be coming out sooner rather than later so that I could get pressure on the wound and not have to worry about accidentally cutting myself further as I tried to move around and get help. Yes, I'd probably get the same speech at the hospital I am giving you now but I know I have at least some knowledge in treating myself.


In an absolutely worst case scenario I could always have grabbed my EDC bag and thrown a tourniquet on myself.


That being said, if this were you, would you have the knowledge and skill to assess your own wound and determine whether or not you would remove the knife yourself and how you might treat it if it didn't stop bleeding?

If you chose to leave the knife in place would you know how to stabilize it? 

Would you know the danger signs of arterial bleeding vs venous? 

Would you know how to treat yourself for potential shock?

What if this had been a firearms accident? Do you know how you would assess yourself for a gunshot wound?

3. Don't underestimate your wound.

I can't say whether or not this individual underestimated his wound or not. I didn't see the wound. But, he called his father-in-law and his father-in-law was who took him to urgent care. He even expressed in the video how this was better than the ER. It very well could have been. However, we have 9-1-1 for a reason. We have ambulances for a reason and we have an ER for a reason. They can be more expensive but don't let saving money be a reason for not calling for more immediate help.

That being said, he's not the first individual who has had an accident like this and not called 9-1-1. My own brother had a firearms accident that was very serious and he drove himself home. Once he got home my father drove him to the hospital. In retrospect, he should have called 9-1-1. Or, at very least, my father should have called 9-1-1 the moment he found out that my brother had accidentally shot himself.

While it did turn out okay in the end, that's a perfect example of someone underestimating the severity of their own wound and not opting for the paramedics with cool drugs in the vehicle that can legally go through stop lights coming to pick you up vs trying to be a man and drive himself. He could have passed out on the road, bled out in the car, all sorts of bad things. There is a time to say, "Hey, I think I need to call 9-1-1."

4. Learn from the experience.

How did you end up hurting yourself? Was it an accident? Was it negligence? Was it someone else's negligence? Was it a bad habit? Was it poor or faulty training? What can you change to make sure something like that never happens again?

Can you learn something else?

The author of this video noted that the entire incident didn't hurt until much later. He said he figured getting stabbed in the leg would hurt like crazy but it didn't at all. We can apply that knowledge to everyone out there who tries to rely on pain compliance for self defense. A lot of times, due to adrenaline and other factors, there may be no pain. Pain compliance is a lousy self defense tool. Can it be used? Absolutely! But it has its time and place and often should be nothing more than a by-product of you doing serious damage to someone.

My brother said getting shot felt like getting stung by a few bees. Like the author of this video he said he didn't really start to hurt until the next morning. And as I remember it he spent several days laying on the floor because it hurt to much for him to even try to get up onto the couch. The day of the incident, however, he was as mobile as though nothing had happened.


It's not impossible that we may have accidents and hurt ourselves. We avoid threats and danger because we don't want to have to use our tools of self defense. But, just in case, we plan for a lot of "what if's." Accidents should be one of them. Plan for them. Avoid them. But plan for them.

Maxpedition Gearslinger Lunada Review

PreSchool backpack, can of coke and Lunada for size.

 The day before my birthday I got an email from Maxpedition asking me if I was willing to review a few of their products. As someone who has carried a Maxpedition bag almost daily for the last five years and was in the process of looking for another one I readily agreed.

It took me a total of a week to pick out the products I wanted to review and around the middle of April I got a box in the mail from Maxpedition. The first bag I put into use was the Lunada.

I told my contact that I would take about a month to review a bag because I wanted time to play with the product, get to know it and see how it held up over time.

I've carried the Lunada for a little over a month now and I am thoroughly impressed with this little bag.

MOLLE on both sides, front and shoulder strap

I say little because it is a smaller bag. Some people I have polled have said they think it looks like a preschool sized backpack and they wouldn't be far off. It's over all length from top to bottom is only 11 inches (give or take some flex) and the width is about 8 inches (give or take flex and any MOLLE attachments you might add. As far as thickness is concerned, totally packed out makes it sit at around 7ish inches.


The bag has five main pockets: A large, open top pocket on the back of the bag filled with hook and loop wherein you can put anything from a gun to a notebook or random odds and ends; a main, large, zippered pouch with two smaller open top pouches and a small zipper pouch; a short and wide pocket on the top of the bag that can fit a pair of shooting glasses with a smaller open top pouch equipped with elastic loops for small items like lighters; a medium-size zipper pouch with more open top pouches and loops and a final zipper pocket on the front of the bag for narrow items.


The bag itself is covered in webbing for any MOLLE attachments you might want to make. My last Maxpedition bag had webbing for MOLLE attachments as well but not in any places I could see reasonable to attach anything. The Lunada is different. I have discovered a love for MOLLE I never had before and have a MOLLE pouch, a knife holder, my trauma sheers and my cell phone holster all
held to the bag with MOLLE. I have plenty of room for more if I want it, too.

Carry Handle

Padding and traction on back of Lunada and shoulder strap

A huge improvement over my last Maxpedition bag is the carry handle on the top of the Lunada. It's made of a neoprene type of material that is comfortable to carry. This is essential if you are going to find yourself quickly carrying the bag from place to place and don't want to sling the entire thing over your shoulder. Or, if you are trying to hang on to it to retreive things from the bag. 

The Lunada comes from the Gearslinger line of Maxpedition products which means that it has one shoulder strap and the bag is mean to be carried across the wearers body. But, unlike the Versipacks, the Gearslingers can be adjusted for either right or left shoulder carry with the switch of hook.

The strap itself is wide and padded and makes for very easy and comfortable all day carry (if you have healthy shoulders and don't weight the bag down too much). The strap also has MOLLE attachments on it and my love for MOLLE has spread to that region. I have attached a wrist watch and a knife and flashlight to the shoulder strap in a location I can easily access with the bag on my back.

Shoulder Strap

The strap is also exceptionally long for adjusting around even the most thick amongst us but can be cinched down quite well for us tiny people as well. What's even better is the addition of an elastic band on the strap that allows you to roll up any excess strap and secure it from floating around and getting in your way.

The strap also had a few D-rings on it for things like keys or whatever else your imagination can foresee connecting to it.

The shoulder strap also has a quick release latch for those of us who may want to escape our bags quickly or run the strap through something for extra security.

 For added security for on-body carry and for a little more support for long walks, a second strap can be secured to the back and shoulder strap to hold it more firmly to the body. There is also a belt-wrap on the back of the bag that allows a third attachment point to the wearer. Those who are into extreme adventuring or find themselves hanging upside down for any reason can be assured that their bag will stay on their back and around their waste and their items will be secure (provided they remembered to zip all of the pockets).

Additional Strap with whistle, belt loop and backing

The back of the bag is padded with a ventilated foam that is wrapped in another breathable rubbery material. Anything hard or pointy in the bag can be carried in comfort and despite a whole month of daily wear and carry I have yet to see any evidence of a breakdown in the material despite the frequency of taking the bag on and off.

I chose the Lunada because it was the smallest Maxpedition bag said to be able to fit a tablet. I was not disappointed. While it won't fit securely in the back-most pocket (it will fit enough to make a quick get-a-way), my Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1, with case, fits perfectly in the main zippered compartment. With little stretching I can also fit my 11.5 inch bluetooth Logitech keyboard that I may take with the tablet for moments like this when I need the ability to do a lot of typing but don't want to lug around a laptop.

Lunada and tablet

The bag itself can hold quite a lot of gear. If you are looking for an Every Day Carry (EDC) bag that has a lot of capacity you may love this bag but you might also think it doesn't have enough.

It is a very compact bag and stuffing some of the pockets may mean a little difficulty in putting things in other pockets.

I use this Lunada as a purse, diaper bag, blow-out bag and just a bit of a "get home" bag. For its size it fits its many rolls very well. I can fit my wallet, diaper and wipes in the bag with my cell phone MOLLE attached to the outside. I like this arrangement because it allows me to answer my phone without having to dig in my bag and I can finally hear my phone when it rings, too. Because I'm a chapstick junky I've also MOLLE attached my chapstick to the outside of the bag while I've put things like my sun/shooting glasses in the top pouch along with sun screen, a lighter, some hand wipes, hair ties and nail file (very useful for those moments when you get your nails broken in someone's face in Krav).

Tablet with Case in Lunada

In my last bag I was forced to spread my blow-out/survival gear all over the bag. In this bag its all in one stop. My pressure bandage, tourniquet, medical tape, chem lights, epi pen, petroleum gauze, compressed gauze and so much more is all in one location. I never have to even open that pocket unless it's an emergency and that keeps everything well organized and in its place.

Tablet with case and 11.5" keyboard in Lunada

In the very outside zipper pocket I have a seatbelt cutter and window breaker and some disposable bibs for my kids and a package of kleenex. Nothing says prepared like being able to wipe a nose and extricate yourself from a vehicle all in one pocket.

Lunada Main Compartment Contents
Tablet, Wallet, Diapers, Wipes, Bandanas,
Crayons, Survival Tin, Lotion, Keyboard (occasionally)

In the smaller compartments inside the main pouch I keep bandaids and femenine products and bandanas, some coflex for my son (who is allergic to bandaids) and a tin with spare batteries for my flashlight and some alieve for Krav nights that
are particularly brutal. I also have a tin of crayons for the kids.

Also attached to the outside of the bag via MOLLE is a small med pouch specifically for my son. Because he is allergic to bandaids and has pretty severe reactions to some bug bites I carry paper tape and some 2x2 gauze, hand sanitation wipes and a tube of Cortisone10. I can take off the pouch and leave it with him without having to empty and repack my bag.

Lunada Main Compartment Zipper Pocket Contents
Bandaids, Condoms, Feminine Hygiene, Medication

With all of that in the bag it's packed pretty tight. Fully packed with tablet and keyboard my bag weighed 14 lbs this morning. I may have been able to pack just one more thing in the main pouch but not without feeling I was
weighing down myself. Some already think I carry way too much on a daily basis. Some would think I don't carry nearly enough. I feel the contents and bag are right on the "just right" line. Any more and I feel I would find myself leaving my bag in my car and opting to just take my wallet and cell phone with me when I needed to make stops which, consequently would make me feel lax in my preparedness as what good does a bag of supplies do you if you don't have them with you when you need them?

Because the bag carries high on the back instead of low around the hip it makes for much easy carry similar to a backpack with less fatigue on the shoulder and neck than with the bags that carry around the hips. The trade off is that it can make you feel as though you can't access the contents of the bag as quickly. With a little good organization, the use of MOLLE and the quick release latch on the strap I have yet to feel as though the bag where too slow to access. I've also developed my own way of quickly switching the bag from back to front carry without having to remove it from my body. I'm also very happy to have the contents of the bag with me vs left in the car. Having the bag on my back also makes me feel as though my arms and side are much more free to carry anything from my children to guns and magazines. 

Middle Zipper Pocket Contents
QuickClot Combat Gauze, Petroleum Gauze,
Epi Pen, Triangular Bandages, Duct Tape,
Compressed Gauze, Chem Lights (Red, Blue),
Medical Tape, Tourniquet, Thin Cinch
Pressure Bandage, 4x4 Surgical Sponges,

Lunada Right
Med Pouch, Sharpie, Tape Measure
Knife/Chapstick Holder

If there is a downside to the bag it might be it's small size. But it may also be its best quality as it's still smaller than some purses but much better organized. We all know that the larger the bag the more likely you are to fill it making it too heavy to comfortably carry. The Lunada fits a lot of stuff but limits you from carrying too much unless you are carrying particularly heavy items like boxes of ammo, lead weights or gold bars. That being said, you are not going to be able to use this bag for anything larger than a tablet, a hardback book and a portable keyboard.

While I've been loving the Lunada for it's very utilitarian design I was a bit bummed that it did not feature a water bottle holder. I am, after all, a mom on the go and water is an important resource and while I understood I could get a MOLLE water bottle holder for the side of the bag it wasn't until I carried around a water bottle in hand for a few weeks that I had my AH-HA moment and realized that the torch holder (the elastic drawstring on the front/top of the bag) actually made a phenomenal water bottle holder. Problem solved!

Also attached to the outside of that pocket is a sort of slip sleeve with some hook and loop I was a bit at a loss with what to do with (other than affix an American flag patch a friend of mine gave to me). Finally, while looking the bag over for places to hide weapons I discovered that would be a pretty good place to conceal a fixed-blade knife. Attaching the sheath to a dog-tag chain and securing it to the bag I now have a nicely concealed neck knife on hand.

To test the water resistance of the bag I decided to turn the hose loose on it on a rain setting. For about thirty seconds I simulated a pretty aggressive downpour. I put paper towels in the bag to see how wet they would get and the only parts of the towels that got wet were those closest or touching the zippers. The water resistance works well but it's certainly not water proof and more than a minute in solid rain may end with the contents of the bag getting wet.

Some people are also concerned that the bag looks too "tactical" giving them away as someone who might be a gun owner. While it's true that this bag is nothing you would take to the opera or even a date at a five-star restaurant it's not as "tactical" looking as people fear.

Hidden Knife

In an attempt to see just what your average lay-person had to say about my bag I conducted a series of interviews of complete strangers. I asked a total of two questions:1) If you were to describe this bag to someone who never saw it before, what general description would you give it? (designer purse, military bag, etc) 2) Given that you can make certain assumptions about people based on the products they use and carry, what, if any, assumptions would you make about me because I'm carrying this bag.

Shooting Glasses in Top Zipper Pocket

Top Zipper Pocket Contents
Hand Wipes, Shooting Glasses, Sunblock, Lipstick,
Hair Ties, Comb, Nail File, Lighter

The overall consensus was that the bag looked outdoorish, hippy or utilitarian. One person said it may look like a tool bag if it weren't for the fact that it was being carried by a woman. Only one person pegged it as being a "military type" bag. The assumptions that were made about me was that I was hipster, someone into whole-foods and natural products, a lesbian and only one person said they figured I was an EMT because of my trauma sheers stuck in the MOLLE. Only a few people (mostly Moms) have stopped me to ask me where I got my bag because they love how organized and comfortable it looked. One man in line behind me at a burger stand said, "Wow! Everything in its place!" when he saw me retrieving certain items from my back without ever even having to turn the
bag around. I said, "Since you brought it up, does this bag scream 'gun' to you?"

He said, "Oh, God, no! Wait. Is there a gun in there?" I told him there was not.

The only person who associated the Lunada with a gun was an off-duty police officer who asked me if the bag was a Maxpedition  and wanted to know where within the bag they kept the hook and loop for the holster having owned Maxpedition products in the past.

Lunada Left with Cell Phone

The conclusion of my surveys was that there was no general impression that made your average individual assume I was any more armed than they were.

The Lunada will remain at the top of my list in terms of EDC bags and I don't believe I will find myself wanting to replace it any time soon.

While my first impression was to feel I made a mistake in that it might turn out to be a little small for my needs, I have discovered that this bag has perfectly fit my needs for what I should be carrying on a consistent basis. While I very well may end up with a larger bag for the car with more "get home" items like a change of clothes for myself and additional pairs of shoes, the Lunada is a perfect choice for the ins and outs of daily life, all that goes along with that and a little more.

If you (male or female) are interested in a good utilitarian bag for EDC carry, I would recommend giving the Lunada a look.

Alternate Use for Torch Hold

Manual Safeties and Children: Should You Have One Without The Other

I was twelve years old when I walked in on a friend of mine who had found my brother's handgun underneath of the bed and was trying to pull the trigger. She couldn't accomplish this task because the firearm was equipped with a manual thumb safety on the side of the firearm that she didn't know how to disengage. I stopped her, helped her unload the pistol and showed her how to use it. I loaded it back up, put it back under my brother's bed and no one was the wiser. I didn't think of that day again until I went to buy my first handgun.

That experience left a huge impression upon me and I insisted on buying and carrying a firearm that had a manual safety.

"Who knows what would have happened had that gun not had a safety," I used to tell people. "I could have lost my best friend."

Because of that singular experience I carried a 1911-style pistol for years, operating under illusion that it and its two manual safeties made me safer and that it would somehow protect against negligence. I also was under the impression that it was necessary in order for me to be safe.

"I just feel better having it," I would say.

As my training progressed and my comfort with all types of firearms expanded I started to learn some valuable lessons regarding what makes a firearm safe and unsafe. My husband and I also started talking about wanting children and suddenly I was faced with a question: Should I own and carry a firearm around my children that does not have a manual safety? Does not having a manual safety make me irresponsible?

I also had to come to terms with what had happened in my brother's bedroom over a decade ago and what that meant for me and for parents everywhere.

Firearms Are Only As Dangerous As We Make Them
A firearm has the potential to be dangerous but I do not believe them to be inherently dangerous. Unloaded they are no more than intricately-working paper weights. Even loaded they don't spontaneously fire. They don't orient themselves to a target and they do not operate of their own accord. It is the action of their handlers that make them a potential danger.

What made the situation in my brother's room so dangerous was not the firearm. It was the access to it. There should never have been a fully-loaded .45 under a bed with easy access to it. Especially with children in the house who did not know how to safely operate it. That action (or inaction, depending on how you want to look at it) is what made the dangerous situation.

That being said, the safety on that firearm only delayed her ability to make that firearm fire. I have no doubt that given enough time and enough button pushing she would have figured out that the safety lever could be disengaged and that a hole could be put through my brother's dresser.

What ultimately ended that situation was not the presence of a safety, it was the presence of a twelve-year-old girl who knew how to safely handle that firearm and had a healthy respect for it. 

I took it from her. I unloaded it. I told her not to point it at anything she didn't want to shoot. I told her to keep her finger off the trigger. I showed her the features of the firearm. I then safely reloaded it, reengaged the safety and put it back where she'd found it. Knowledge and proficiency did far more to neutralize that situation than a safety could have ever done.

Had I been an ignorant child who was just as curious as to the workings of the firearms as she was who knows what kind of an ending I would be writing about today, or if I would even be here to write about it. Which makes me believe that far more than any safety feature on any gun should be a drive to teach your children in your home how to safely handle every firearm you own.

Safeties As A Crutch
It doesn't happen all the time but every now and then I get someone who will use the safety feature on their firearm as a crutch to do something negligent with said firearm.

I was in a pistol class not to long ago where a man thought his firearm's safety was engaged. I told him it was not. He did not believe me. To attempt to prove me wrong he pointed the firearm at the ground and pulled the trigger. The whole class jumped about two feet in the air when there was a rather large, "BANG!"

The instructor screamed, "WHAT WAS THAT!?!"

The man sheepishly mumbled, "I thought it was on safe."

He learned some valuable lessons that day. 1) Never use a safety as an excuse to break the rules of safe gun handling and 2) don't let your ego get the best of you.
At least no one was hurt.

That event should never have happened. But situations like it happen every day. And they happen in homes with children. People leave their firearms unattended where children can access them and think it's okay because the firearm has a safety. They put their finger on the trigger or point it at things they aren't willing to destroy or generally act a fool because, "Hey, man, what's the big deal. It's on safe!"

The rules of safe gun handling are universal, safety feature or not and if you treat every firearm as though it has no safety at all you are going to save yourself at least the embarrassment of putting a round in something you didn't intend to shoot or, at most, a life.

A safety feature is not a replacement for good gun handling. Period!

The Benefits of a Safety
All of that being said, there is a benefit to having a safety feature. It does delay the firing of a handgun.

Notice I said "delay," not "prevent."

Children who have the time and inclination to figure out how to make a firearm work will eventually try to flip that little lever down (or up.. or in.. or over, depending on the firearm) and when they do there will be no stopping them unless there is someone there with a little more knowledge and proficiency to stop them or guide them in what they are doing. 

The  Drawbacks of a Safety
Other than a safety being used as justification for poor gun handling, a safety can also be a road block to winning a gun fight. Just like a safety delays a gun being fired when you don't want it to be fired it can also delay someone firing a gun when they want to shoot it.

Most advocates of manual safeties say this is a training issue. It can be. Lots of people do not train with their firearms enough whether they have a manual safety or not. But those who have manual safeties need to put in a few extra hours of practice to make sure they disengage it consistently on the draw. Even then, it's not always guaranteed.

Anyone who's been shooting with a manual safety long enough and regularly enough will admit to missing the safety at least once. Even if they didn't forget it there's always that time that your finger slipped off the safety while you were trying to disengage it and you had to try again. Could that mean the difference between life and death? Perhaps.

Or, you could have my bad fortune and have your manual safety break.

Many moons ago, while I was still carrying a 1911, said 1911 fell out of my shoulder holster I hadn't secured like I thought and impacted on the back side of the grip. The force of the fall actually racked the slide beneath the manual safety about a quarter of an inch and bent the safety out of the frame. It basically pinned the slide out of battery and the safety on. I did not notice it until I got it home to check it over after such a hard fall. It took almost my whole body weight to disengage the safety from the slide and allow the firearm to return to battery. Had I needed that firearm between the time it fell and the time I got home I would have been in for a very rude awakening when I went to thumb off that safety and it never budged.

Lastly, the safety can be a giveaway.

Even with all of the drawbacks I listed above and my broken safety, I continued to carry a firearm with a manual safety on it. I did not even begin to question my decision until I read the first hand account of a man who was caught up in a gun fight with his 1911.


He was in a meeting and carrying a 1911. The perpetrator came in and ordered everyone onto the floor. The man drew his gun from his holster and laid on top of it anticipating having to use it. But when he flicked off the safety the perpetrator heard the noise and came to investigate. A gunfight ensued and thankfully the goodguy won even though he did end up getting shot a few times.

A one-in-a-million happenstance? Absolutely! But it happened non-the-less.

That was the beginning of the end for me and my personal obsession with manual safeties.

I finally realized that manual safeties don't actually make a firearm more safe. They gave an illusion of safety, which, in the end, could prove to be more dangerous.


I came to the conclusion that there was no real advantage to requiring a safety on my carry firearms and I was only limiting myself, my shooting experiences and training. Was I ever going to be faced with a true drawback of having a safety? Probably not. But why limit myself? Getting rid of the safety crutch freed me to embrace and carry many more firearms I've greatly enjoyed getting to know.

I also realized that I did not need a manual safety to be a safe handler.

The manual safety continues to prevail in many agencies and in many homes.

Do I think that manual safeties have their place in the gun industry? Absolutely! And I will never criticize anyone who demands their firearm have a safety feature.

I think it's important, however, to realize what a manual safety is and what it isn't, how to use it, and to use it appropriately. And to never use a safety as an excuse to be negligent or in the place of common sense.

For the last several years I've carried firearms without a manual safety. Glocks, M&Ps, revolvers, the list goes on and I've continued to have the safe handling and accident free record I had before I lifted my ban on non-manual-safetied firearms.

When it comes to carry, the most important aspect is the holster and ensuring the trigger guard is completely enclosed in a well fitting holster. When it comes to storage the most important aspect is being attentive of the firearm, where and how it is stored and securing it in a way that children cannot access it. Better yet is teaching children to handle a firearm so that if they do come across it they do not handle it negligently. 

You Are The Safety! Be safe. Make your gun safe with or without a manual safety. 

New Boundaries And Kubatons

Over the weekend our Krav instructor was at the Tactical Defense Institute getting a brush up on his technique in impact weapons such as batons, kubatons, canes and other striking instruments.

Whenever our instructor goes out to train we can always expect to go over that same material when he gets back. When he went to a ground fighting class he came back and we did ground fighting for a month. When he went to a knife class we spent a few classes on knives. When he went to a personal control class we were doing joint manipulations and submissions. So, I was very much expecting some impact weapons when showing up at class.

I was not disappointed.

He walked into class carrying a handful of foam paint brushes. These would be our trainer kubatons. He also had an armful of foam wrapped PVC pipes for batons. 

Just as we were getting started a fourteen-year-old girl and her family came in and our instructor asked her if she wanted to participate. Even though she shied away from the idea at first, he convinced her to come and join us.

We worked some strikes and simple techniques with our foamish kubatons and then we worked on each other. There was only two of us in class besides the girl since my husband injured his hand and so I was paired with the girl for the first part of the class. It was no surprise to me that she was very timid and it took a lot of encouragement to get her to do any kind of striking but she was willing to learn and apply herself. She did very well for her first time.

Later on we switched partners and I got paired with the biggest guy in our class. A former wrestler who is probably on the plus side of 250 lbs and somewhere north of 6'3". But he knows how to spar. His seventeen year-old daughter comes to Krav with him often and he doesn't let up on us little gals. He'll make me work for whatever I get which is great.

After a while our instructor introduced a scenario. He was trying to explain to the girl that someone trying to take her to another location was meaning her great harm and it was time to go nuts.

He started circling her asking her to go to a party. She curled her arms to her chest and was saying no but he persisted. Finally he reached out his hand and grabbed hers and started dragging her away. She laughed the sort of nervous giggle of someone who doesn't know what to do and made a few attempts to hit around his hand but he was able to drag her off the mat with little effort.


Then he turned to me.

"You want to come to a party with me?"

"No!" I answered.

He was circling me and staying deliberately outside of my striking distance.

"Come on. Come to a party with me."

"No! Get away!"

"Come on. It's a really cool party. Come with me."

He wavered on my striking boundary and when he leaned forward to cross it I plowed into him, striking his chest with my open hand and bringing my trainer kubaton down on his neck and collar bone. Over and over again I smashed his chest and collar bone area in what he called a recurring hammer first.

I drove him back and disengaged, stepped back, got back in my fighting stance and said, "I don't want to fight!"

He laughed, "I was trying to show her what you would do if I grabbed you but you didn't let me get to that."

Everyone laughed. My husband, JD, sitting on the side lines just smiled and said, "BIG difference from just a couple of months ago! Good job."

So as our instructor approached me again he said, "Let me grab you this time."

I let him grab me by the throat, took my kubaton and got control of his arm and when I had it he said, "Now what are you going to do?" And without much thought I delivered a pretty good kick to the groin. Perhaps just a little harder than I had meant. Even with a cup he fell to the floor with a look of discomfort on his face.

"I meant TELL me what you were going to do."

We had a little more fun after that. Every great once in a while we abandon all structure and just play and which ever student our instructor is playing with ends up on the floor in some strange ball of pain-induced submission. Every GREAT once in a while we students can keep the upper hand and get him to tap out. I was laughing as I tapped out, laying on the floor, with my feet out in front of me and my arm twisted in ways I'm pretty sure arms are not supposed to twist.

When we left class JD told me again what a big difference it was watching me from just a month ago when I would let him and others get far too close to me.

I told him I had that "ah-ha" moment and realized that if someone is getting close to me and I tell him no or to get away from me that his continuing to get closer to me is an overt threat and I will attack when he crosses my strike boundary.

He was pleased with this. It took me a little bit to finally get it but now that it's there it's pretty set.

And I am LOVING working with a kubaton. I've carried one for years and have always liked the idea of a striking weapon (of course, mine also has pepper spray in it so it's even better) but I've never had much training in one. I was always told that I could use a kubaton similarly as to how I would use a knife and that was enough for me, but seeing all the other fun stuff that can be done with it makes me that much more happy to have one on my person. The kubaton is my new best friend and I hope we continue to work with it for some time.

I know eventually we are going to be moving on the the baton and I'll see what there is to see there but I'm thinking the kubaton and I are going to be special friends for quite some time.

Train Your Young Kids for Security

This isn't so much about guns as it is about security of young children in or around the first grade or younger category.

If I had a nickle for every time my son called me a mean mommy I'd have somewhere around a dollar or two. I am strict. I demand obedience. When I don't get it, I discipline. I don't negotiate with my children when it comes to matters of keeping them safe.

Some think I'm too strict. They think I don't give enough leniency to my children. I don't let them be kids.

I do let my children be children. They can go outside and play and make noise and throw toys and be the children they want to be... in certain venues.

When it comes to places I have not and cannot secure, however, I become mommy-bodyguard. And when a bodyguard takes on a client that client has certain rules he needs to follow in order to be secured. Even the president gets ordered around by Secret Service when it comes to security and so my children (son, 4 years old; daughter, 1 year old) have sets of orders they are expected to follow as well.

1. They should be quiet.
Not in the "children should be seen and not heard" sense but in the "no screaming and making unnecessary noise" sense. I love talking to my son and chattering with him when we are out and about but if he's screaming and making unnecessary noise he is a huge distraction from everything else going on. The same is said for my daughter. She's still quite young to understand being quiet but we're working on her. My son does very well.

If he wants to take a toy with him places it is a toy that doesn't make noise. When he talks, I expect him to use a conversational voice unless it is a true emergency. And then he is expected to scream bloody murder.

2. The busier the environment the closer they stay to me.
Again, my daughter is still young. She's walking now and enjoying her freedom but when out and about she still is mostly confined to a carrier, a cart or stroller. When not crowded I will let her walk around but only if she's holding her brother's hand. She doesn't always like her big brother holding on to her but I prefer it that way. Then they are together and I'm not having to split my attention in several directions.

And as it gets busier I will take my daughter and my son is told to stay with me. If he's having a hard time with distractions that will mean holding on to the shopping cart, my shirt or bag. Disobeying is met with discipline. I cannot risk the lives of my children because they couldn't obey me when I told them what to do.

3. They should leave if I tell them to leave. 
After reading the article Are Your Instincts Putting Your Child In Danger by Greg Ellifritz I realized that the instinct to collect your children to yourself may not be the best one. If in a confrontation you may be the one that is drawing violence that you do not want your children caught up in. At very least you may need mobility to move and act without your children hanging on to you or under your feet.

I know the idea of sending your child away when there is danger is completely opposite of everything a parent feels and I struggled to accept that concept as valid. But there is a logic to it that cannot be denied and it's imperative that your judgement in the matter be clear.

Are you being targeted or your child? Are there multiple attackers that could collect the child and use him or her as a human shield depending on which direction you send your child?

Something that has been talked about before is the difference between running from danger and running towards safety. A young child might not be able to distinguish the difference and so you may have to be very specific in your instructions to him or her.

If you have older children this might not be so scary. You can sit down with a fifteen year-old and explain what you expect of him or her and even trust him to look out for himself to a point. Telling a young teen to run out the back of the store and to lock himself in the car is not an unreasonable request nor should it be too difficult for him to accomplish. A four-year-old, however, or those with developmental delays can be a different story.

Young or delayed children may be confused by commands or too frightened to act on them. What we have practiced with our children is creating short distances. If you are in a store and pushing a cart or stroller, push the cart away from you and tell him to go to the cart or stroller. Pick a place in a store that the child knows and loves like the toy department or, in the case of our local grocery store, the bakery with the Thomas the Train cakes on display. While I would be loath to send my young child out of my sight it's better than him getting caught between me and a bad guy, especially if guns might be coming out.

This can become even harder for those of us with little ones still in arms and though I've consulted with Ellifrtiz on this topic we both drew a blank without more trial and error and I've come to the conclusion that some things don't have good solutions. You wouldn't want to drop your baby to fight as dropping a child can be just as damaging to him or her as any incoming violence. If you carry your baby in some sort of carrier you will likely not have time to remove him or her. If in a physical altercation your child will be in the middle of it.

My personal recommendation for people with babies in arms would be to increase your personal space and heighten your suspicion of those who get inside that space. I'd also recommend carrying a non-lethal tool such as pepper spray that is particularly easy to access. Clipped right to the baby carrier is a good start. In hand when possible is even better. This allows you at least to have a non-lethal option of some distance that will allow for some sort of defense that doesn't require physically tangling with someone with your baby in the middle or going to lethal options like guns.

I carry a combination kubaton/pepper spray canister on my keys which I keep in hand whenever I'm carrying my daughter. Even though I have a gun on my hip I already have a defensive tool in my hand. Even if approached with lethal force I can immediately pepper spray and buy myself a moment to get out my gun (if it's still needed) and/or get out of there.

And when it comes to guns, work, work, work your one-hand drills. 

4. They should get into car seats quickly and through the same door.
We all know parking lots are common attack points. And mothers loading kids into cars are pretty prime targets, especially if she has more than one and has to move around the car getting all of her kids into it. All the doors are typically unlocked and some open. You don't have to look hard to see stories or videos of criminals plopping themselves down in the passenger seats of unlocked cars while the owner pumped gas, loaded groceries or sat there surfing on a cell phone.

I prefer to have one location in which my children enter our vehicle so that I can funnel the access to the vehicle. When we approach our vehicle I unlock it with the key fob. Once all doors are unlocked I open the door through which my children will enter and then I immediately lock all of the doors. That way, should I have to slam the door I know my children will be safely locked in and no one can enter the vehicle through another door or even the door my kids just entered. I then clip my keys to person, mainly because I don't want to put them down on the backseat while strapping my kids in their seats and end up locking them in the car and myself out of it (been there, done that). 

When the kids are in the car I check around me before diving in to snap buckles. With only one child or a larger vehicle you can get in the car and shut the door while fastening straps as well, for those with multiple children or smaller cars that might be more difficult.

As my children age and are able to master sequences like getting into the car, locking the door and putting on a seatbelt this might change, but as they are young and still need a lot of help I prefer to keep access to the car as limited as possible. It also keeps me from having to worry about my kid running off into a busy parking lot while waiting for me to buckle in his little sister.

5. Talk to Strangers
WHAT?!?!

You heard me!

I teach my children to talk to strangers. Because if I'm on the floor, tangled up with some bad guy, I want my child to be comfortable approaching someone for help and identifying himself (more on that later).

Police officers are strangers. EMTs are strangers. Firefighters are strangers. Nurses are strangers. Doctors are strangers. And these are all people that I hope my child would be comfortable talking to if in need. So the key here is not to teach him not to talk to strangers but to talk to the least risky ones and what conversation is appropriate and inappropriate.

High-risk stranger: solo guy taking pictures of kids at the play ground.
Low-risk stranger: Mom pushing two kids in a shopping cart.

Appropriate conversation: Where's your Mom? Let's go find her!
Inappropriate conversation: Want to help me find my puppy? 


While down in Tennessee these last two weeks I had opportunity to go out to a lot of kid-friendly places like the zoo and different stores and eateries. The level of distraction and lack of control of some parents absolutely astounds me, not from a parenting stand-point (that's their own business) but from a security stand-point. If those parents needed to suddenly act in defense I can see little less than disaster ensuing.

Thankfully, having to defend yourself around your children is pretty rare. But that's what we're good at preparing for, isn't it?

Stay Tuned for Part 2: Other Things To Consider In Child Security

A Funny Thing Happened At Partner Tactics

In May of 2012, my husband and I loaded up our gear and took the longish journey down to the Tactical Defense Institute (TDI) in West Union, OH. We'd taken the trip a few times before for Handguns 1-3 and for Defensive Knife but this was the first time we were going to do some training for the collective us. We'd wanted to take a partner's tactics class for years and we were finally doing it.

TDI's Partner Tactics class is hailed as one of the funnest classes to take. I can't speak for everyone but it was a lot of fun, very relaxing, enjoyable weather and some great company. We got to see old friends and meet new ones or meet old friends' better halves. While the class is designed for any kind of partner dynamic, be it military, police or otherwise, the majority of the students were husband and wife duos which made the class a sort-of pseudo marital retreat. Many couples had been to the class several times, making a sort of romantic holiday of it.

The three day course consists of partner movement drills while also communicating with him or her both verbally and non-verbally. Something a lot harder to do in practice than in theory. We learned partner room clearing, up and down stairs, around corners, through hallways, etc. We learned escaping vehicles, cover, concealment, group settings, partner rescue, leap-frogging and all sorts of other great tools for partners who need to work together with guns.

Attending the class for a second time was an older couple we will call Bill and Jane. Bill was in his late seventies and Jane in her late sixties. She was about as hyper as I am and three times as talkative. No matter where she went she left a sea of smiles behind her because of her propensity to suddenly jump off a flight of stairs or say something completely off the wall but hilarious. At the same time she was deathly serious about everything making it that much more entertaining and endearing.

They were dressed far more for comfort than for any semblance of style. They both wore large frame glasses and she wore a blurred patch over one eye to help her with eye-dominance issues. Their hat wear looked as though it may have come from an advertisement for an African Safari and they both wore tan shooting vests with more pockets than military utilities. But not to be threatened with appearing average, she would don a different colorful scarf or otherwise bright and colorful oddity to remind the world she was still very much young at heart.

While doing stair-clearing drills with unloaded firearms she had us all cracking up with her "PEW! PEW!" sound effects. While doing the walk through of the shoot houses, you could find her skulking around corners, crawling around obstacles and using her finger as a pistol while things were being explained.

Her husband was a quite a bit more serious and took her shenanigans in stride. Always by her side he rarely opened his mouth unless they were on the firing line and needed to communicate as that fighting team. At which point, he communicated ceaselessly...

"Firing! Changing! Moving! What's the condition of your gun?! Check your world!"

The couple had their own lingo they had brought with them to the class ("green" meaning the individual had a loaded and functioning firearm in the fight, "red" meaning the firearm was not functional and needed his or her partner to cover) and it worked well for them. They were both so serious about everything and seemingly completely unaware of the joy they spread to the rest of the group.

On the second day we all went up to the upper range to practice shooting our way out of vehicles and then using partner tactics to get to safety.

The scenario starts with the partnered pair sitting in an old, beat up van, seat belted and doors locked. On the command of "fire" or "gun" the pair was to engage a number of targets on both sides of the van (and hidden around other cars), egress from the vehicle and move to safety.

Everyone had their turn and next up was Bill and Jane.

Jane got in the driver's side and Bill got in the passenger's side. They strapped themselves in, shut the doors and waited. The instructor yelled, "GUN!!!" and it was on.

Except nothing happened.

We were all sitting a few yards to the rear of the van, waiting for gunfire, the doors on the van to bust open, anything!

Nothing. The van didn't move. The doors didn't open. There seemed to be absolutely nothing going on. The instructor, who had moved to the rear of the van to stay out of the way, peeked around the corner with the same look of confusion as the rest of us. He took a step forward, presumably to see what the hold up was and the driver's side door flew open.

Jane rang out a long, blood-curdling war cry, "DIE!!!!!!!"

And all hell broke loose. Gunfire broke out from each side of the van as Bill and Jane fired and everyone else broke down laughing.

They moved down the sides of the van screaming at each other ("MOVING TO THE REAR!") and their targets.

When they finally made it to the back we were nearly in tears from laughing so hard.

Jane got in what was fast becoming her classic squat. Legs wide spread, squatting down until her butt nearly touched the ground, arms stretching her gun out in front of her leaning from side to side like some skinny, oddly dressed creature out of a Lord of the Rings movie with a gun. She was screaming, "GREEN!"

Bill, standing more erect, was comical only in the absence of his wife's erratic, bouncy and sometimes sporadic movement answered with, "GREEN! Are you alright?"

"I'M ALRIGHT! GREEN!" she answered.

"CHECK YOUR WORLD!"

"CHECKING MY WORLD! CLEAR ON THE RIGHT!" Her body bounced right to left like some strange ape while he stood over her merely looking side to side.

"CLEAR ON THE LEFT! TAC RELOAD! RED"

Jane, "GREEN!"

But no matter what, we could not get over the hilarity that was this sixty-some-year-old woman, dressed in a safari hat, colored scarf and tactical vest, throwing open the car door and screaming, "DIE!" at the top of her lungs.

Even though I wouldn't be laughing if I had to face the both of them in a gun battle. They were an effective pair!

My Freeze: Boundaries

Over the last couple of days there's been a little spike in the conversation about "the freeze." This in part due to the questions that were born out of my post: Abuse, Abduction, Self Defense. Questions like, "Why didn't she call for help?" "Why didn't anyone help?"

Kathy Jackson over at Cornered Cat did a fantastic job covering the topic so I won't try to reinvent her words. Her blog, Fear And The Freeze Response is a must read. So, go.. read.

A Girl And Her Gun also talks about the aftermath of the freeze and how it can have an effect on self perception.

The sad fact of the matter is, many (dare I say, most) people don't even know that the freeze response exists. If they are aware of it they somehow think it will not happen to them. Or, they may have experienced it but in such a low-stress-level environment that consequences of the freeze were negligible or at most, embarrassing (freezing up at a business meeting). If they experience it on a tragic level it is in a non-violent environment: a car accident, natural disaster or major injury. In these environments it seems understandable that one would freeze. Often times there is nothing that could have been done even if there were no freeze so the freeze is rather inconsequential to how events unfolded.

People who do experience the freeze response when faced with violent crime, however, are suspect. If not outwardly questions as to why they froze they often find themselves looking inward and questioning their own sense of preparedness and worth. If they survive, the looming question can often be, "What was wrong with me? Why didn't I do something?"


I could watch surveillance videos of violent crimes almost all day. I have a strong stomach for it. I find analyzing them to be fascinating and as long as I can slow things down I can catch things that some people miss. It's a lot different than watching a movie where you are shown exactly what you are supposed to see and understand. In a surveillance video you are often questioning everything and discovering what you are supposed to see and what investigating what is important.

What can I learn about how the attack started? Where did the attack come from? Were there pre-attack indicators that were missed? When was the weapon presented (if at all)? Was there a freeze? How/when was the freeze broken? What for knowledge isn't in the video such as relationship between victim and attacker? How does that play into the dynamic?

One thing I have universally noted is that in almost every single video, if you know what you are looking for, is a freeze. A moment of disbelief, a moment of hesitation while the brain wraps itself around the reality of the situation, even moments of paralysis where victims or bystanders stand stock still throughout the entirety of the crime.

The freeze is there. It is hard wired in us. It can and will happen to you. It's nothing to be ashamed of or to question. It happens! It's time to stop beating ourselves up about it and learn to embrace it and/or minimize it when necessary.

I'm in the middle of reading Rory Miller's Facing Violence: Preparing for the Unexpected. In it he dedicates an entire chapter to the freeze and ways you can eliminate some types of freezes and minimize others and even tactically use other types. But he makes it very clear that you will never do away with the freeze 100%.

But, you may be like me and think, "Okay, I'll admit. The freeze will be there. How do I find out where my freeze is and how do I train it out of me or at least minimize it?" 

Some freezes you may never find until the time comes. Some freezes you may be able to find in training. Sometimes those freezes are nothing more than a training issue. You're in a shoot out and your firearm jams. Because you've never practiced clearance drills you stand there staring at a non functioning gun because you haven't trained yourself what to do in that scenario. Establishing a trained and regular response (tap, rack, bang) to that particular scenario (an jammed gun) can eliminate that freeze.

But other freezes are not so easy to identify.

Just recently I discovered a big one in myself and if you want to see if, watch this video:

 

Watch between :04 and :11 seconds in the video. There is a threatening presence. He has cornered me. He is within my striking distance. At one point he even threatens me by saying, "I'm not letting you leave." And I still don't act. I'm stuck in a frozen loop of repeating the same command that he's clearly demonstrated he's not going to obey.

You would think I learned my lesson. This video was taken almost three years ago. I can't make the same mistake twice, can I?

Enter last week:

Due to weather we had a very small turn out in Krav class and it was just my husband, myself and our instructor. Because it was just the three of us our instructor let us decide what we wanted to work on and my husband volunteered some of my issues. Such as my freeze.

It can be easy to know you need to attack when you are being attacked, but the fact of the matter is that is far too late in many scenarios--including the scenario above. Recognizing this, our instructor set up my husband as my attacker and started working some drills to get me to attack him when he got within striking distance.

And then he messed everything up.

After resetting the scenario my instructor walked up to me and asked if I had any ID. I looked at him, confused. Why did he need my ID? I've been in his class for months. He knows who I am.

"Hey, let me see your ID!" he said and it hit me that this might be a set up to distract me from an attack from the side by my husband.

While trying to keep my husband in my peripheral my instructor got closer. I began to feel myself getting overwhelmed by his closeness and demanded he get away from me, EXACTLY as I did in the video from almost three years ago.

He got closer and closer and eventually my husband did rush in and attack me and I fought him off as I'd been taught. But once the scenario ended both my instructor and my husband pointed out that I let my instructor break the boundary we'd been working on all night and get FAR too close and I failed to act as I'd been trained. The newness of the attack with the change in attacker and him presenting with a seemingly innocuous question completely froze my trained response until I could identify a clear threat: my husband rushing me out of the corner of my eye.

We reset the scenario a few more times and I no longer froze, having recognized my error and trained past it.... at least for that day and in that environment.

Boundaries are my freeze. I need to set clearer boundaries that I do not allow people to cross.

Does that mean I'm going to hit anyone who gets within three feet of me? No, but my intuition told me something was off about that scenario and I wasted time questioning myself and trying to figure it out instead of acting on my training. And, again, I gave him a command to get away from me and instead of complying he continued to move in. As before, I froze myself in a loop of wasted commands. Such an act should have been an immediate trigger that told me it was time to act. Instead, I froze, just like I did three years ago.

Greg Ellifritz (incidentally, the man I was fighting in the linked video) wrote a very nice, short article about boundaries. Rory Miller also talks about boundaries (though he uses a different word) that should be triggers for you to act. If this happens, I respond with this! You won't think of everything, of course, but it can and will help minimize some of those moments of freeze.

Set boundaries!