Women's Self Defense - Having a Plan

Last week my wife was not feeling well and decided to sleep in the living room. She left the door to the back yard open and had an overhead fan running. Before retiring to our bedroom, I asked her what she would do if some drug addled rapist or a burglar came crashing through the door. Her reply was to get a handgun or at the least one of my tactical folding knives and defend herself.

This might have sounded like a good idea to her at the moment, since I'm an avid gun and knife collector, so I do have those items nearby. The problem was my more direct question; "well exactly what will you do?" She had no good idea. She only knew that there was a handgun "over there someplace" and there was a folding knife as well as some pepper spray, in the drawer of the end table.

She's no trained knife expert and even though I'd walked her through the steps of locating the handgun and bringing it to bear on an attacker many times, she really had no inkling of it's exact location, let alone bailing off the sofa, scrambling across the room, locating the gun and pointing it, with any chance of beating someone that crashed through an aluminum screen door.

Just as we all can perform certain tasks like rubbing our eye to remove a dust particle or scratching our arm in the right place without the slightest thought, I told her that this type of reaction, like locating and using a weapon was much the same. It had to become a natural action through many hundreds or even thousands of "dry runs" until it was as normal as taking a step while walking.

We parted with the advice - repeated several times - that she would run screaming to our bedroom where I would be there, waiting and prepared for any eventuality. Don't think you have a plan. Be sure you have a solid plan for self defense and practice your plan until it becomes a natural response!