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Church is a place that people go to connect with their God. Most people end up letting their guard down as they feel safe at church. My wife had an experience recently while she was praying alone during the day at a local house of worship. She got the feeling of dread while she was in her quiet corner of the church like a premonition of something bad was about to happen. I will tell her experience and relate it to an important self-defense issue for women.
One area of self-defense for women has nothing to do with fighting but is very important for women’s safety! If someone is stalking you (the women or anyone), you first try and avoid if possible. One way might be walking inside andlocking your door or simply not walking through a bad looking neighborhood. But what do you do if you cannot avoid the situation? Here is a picture of a scary looking church I found on flicker here.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/deed.en
If you cannot avoid the stalker/attacker/creep, you have to let him know to leave you alone! I am not talking about averting your eyes but rather speaking up and demanding to be left alone if you suspect bad intentions.
What do I mean? You should yell at the person to get away! Let him know you are not going to be quitely bullied into submission! What is the alternative? Why some bad guys will take full advantage of misplaced politeness and rob, attack and abduct women.
You might be wondering what happened to my wife? A couple of minutes after feeling the dread, she felt eyes on her. The church she was at had a glass barrier at the entrance where he could see her (call her Sly). Sly turned and caught him (a man wearing sunglasses) staring and pacing back and forth. He at one point came into the main part of the church and sat down in the near the center isle but soon hopped up again.
He kept looking over at Sly (the only other person in the church) and then rounded the back glass enclosed wall to come up behind Sly. She turned as he reached out for her arm. Sly jumped up and yelled, “What do you want?!, Ya want something?!!”
The guy froze, stuttering and said he was a worshiper there and ran out the door. A grounds man came running into the church and asked Sly what was wrong but the guy left too fast for him to see.
This could have turned out really bad for Sly but she had the fortitude to confront the guy rather than trying to talk him out of whatever he was going to do. Women should always trust their instincts or premonitions because often times your feelings will be spot on.
I heard a speech on the web by Joanne Factor where she was drawing a corollary to zebra andwomen. Paraphrasing she said the zebra would pretend not to see the lions to keep from getting attacked… it was really funny some of her examples but she drove the point home. If you feel like you are in danger – don’t ignore it… act on it!
My wife is sensitive and has escaped many scary situations in her lifetime. One of her projects is her paranormal website called paranormaland.com. Please feel free to visit if you are interested in the strange, unexplained paranormal events such as ghosts, aliens, chupacabra, Bigfoot, crop circles and such.
Women and children should first try and avoid bad situations and if you cannot, speak up and confront your attacker to let him know you will not go quietly. Fight back to get away but whatever you do – do not get into a vehicle of a kidnapper. You have a far better chance if you avoid, confront, fight and get away!
November 15th, 2008 at 12:16 am
Hey John, we’ve been learning to defend ourselves against this very thing. Last week we were taught to not only pull away if someone grabs your arm, but to step into his space and then do what you need to from there, your knee in his groin, or your elbow in his face, the object is to get your attacker to loose his footing. I’m glad your wife made a noise, and didn’t get hurt by this creep.
Amanda
November 15th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
Howdy Amanda,
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This sounds like great advice! When you do get an advantage it is important to not let up. For instance when you knee the groin, you can also pull the back of the head/hair to make your eye-strike/elbow more effective. Hooking the back of his foot and pushing him over is not a bad way to make a hasty retreat too. To much unexpected stuff that is causing pain it better than not too much. It is easier to get away. I really like that your instructor is teaching this stuff to you.
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My wife hung out in the church for a little while and was very cautious walking home – to the point of walking across the street to verify she was not followed before cutting across to our house.
December 18th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
A pepper spray on your keychain always helps to give me a safer feeling, since it will stop a punk from getting close to you. Works up to 12-15 feet, which is plenty of breathing room. Don’t leave home w/o it!
Remember, spray first & ask questions later…
Sparky the Stun Gun
December 19th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Funny you should say that but my wife took some pepper spray the next time she went over to the church to pray. Without trying to take too much advantage of the obvious pun, you are preaching to the choir
January 7th, 2011 at 2:13 am
Nice blog! I enjoyed it. Thank you!
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