self defense

 This year in our family we have put a lot of effort into making our home  and ourselves more prepared .  as part of those efforts tonight I took a women's self defense class  and to be honest I wasn't sure what to expect.  There were about 25 other women and two instructors they were great teachers they have for the past 15 years been the training team for the local police departments here on all of their defense and weapon training and one has three 3 black belts and the class was held at his tae kwon do studio.   I feel that it is great information so to help me remember and possibly educate others I will share a few things I learned. They spent the first hour talking about our mind set and how that is more important than our training or our skill. but that we are to be confident and  to be alert.  They said if you have to use physical defense you were not being prepared or alert enough of your surroundings.

1st thing was to be a hard target, when you walk out of a store do not be staring at your phone, have your head up and at a constant swivel looking around checking stuff out.  That way you do not walk right into danger.

•  know where you are, so you can be located by police if you call
•  have vehicle awareness.
• always lock your doors while in the car, much harder to be car jacked with doors locked.
•  never admit you are alone, when some one is at the door or on the phone.

2nd we all though the most likely place to be attacked was in a parking out, but they said that is not the case, you will be tested there though, so some one may come up and make a unappropriated comment or grab you  and it is how you react depending on if they will pursue you as a target, but if you are direct and forceful and use verbal  self defense they will realize you are tough and they should move on to an easier target.  But look at them in the eyes and yell GET BACK!! with the meanest look on your face....
   If they do decide to target you they may then decide to follow you, and if you are sure someone is then call the police and they can help, do not go home, because then they know where you live and can come back.
  They talked about all kinds of lures and how to handle them and realize how people may be trying to trick you, and many times we just need to follow our intuition and if we feel bad about a situation  get out as soon as possible.

3rd. do crisis rehearsal, many times throughout a day, have mental images what do and what you see yourself doing if such and such is happening and how do I see myself winning the situation.  if we know what our plan is for instance if some one breaks into the house then in that panic situation because you have rehearsed it in your mind it will much easier to do and remember and not just do nothing because you are in shock and panicking.
  They talked about road rage and how many people even here in my town are being shot with instances of it and how driving safe and being courteous is the first step, but then to  back off if someone is mad at you, no matter whose fault it is say sorry and wave them on.  do not ever make more trouble by yelling and hand gestures it just makes it worse.  never ever show them a gun if you had one, even though you think that will scare them away it most of them time just escalates matters.

Then we moved on to  the physical portion of our class we practiced lots of hand thrust, mainly to the face, that is the best place to strike an attacker, much more painful than the groin. Either  gouge eyes,  thrust at nose or throat.  Then we practiced kicks and knee thrusts as well.  All this time having our arms up in protection  and yelling get back.
  The we did kubaton training.  It is like a mini baton, it is kept on your keys like a key chain and we can use it to whip and fling your keys around to create distraction and  hurt them, and you can also hold it differently and use it as a thrusting device on any hard bony area like face  or if they grab you, you could rake their wrist or whatever else.
 Next they spoke about pepper spray and how it is such a great defense mechanism, that they had both been sprayed many times in training and been tazered and the pepper spray was much worse. that you can have a straight stream and it can spray 10-15 feet away.  We were able to practice spraying it on targets outside too.  I actually have mine on my key chain and it is in a kubaton shape so it can be used as both.  Just in case you are interested this is a link to mine.  it has a lock on it, a child could spray it if they really tried, we have talked to our kids about it they know it is dangerous and I always keep it our of their reach. but if in a situation it did spray it, it has no permanent damage. just painful.
  all in all I thought the class was really informative and eye opening and will-help me be more aware of my surroundings and prepared and just like everything if you are prepared you do not have as much to be fearful of.