Trauma Adjacent Aftermath

 Trauma Adjacent Aftermath

Hey everybody, I planned on writing “what numbers you should know” for this installment of the blog. However, sometimes the blog has to follow where my head is at the moment.  This is one of those blogs.

A week or so ago I responded to a medical call. The call came from a young woman having a panic attack. The panic attack was due to a csc (criminal sexual conduct) that occurred the previous night.

She did not want Law Enforcement involved, nor did she want to answer any questions about the incident.

 

That got me thinking...

As hard as team #500 Rising is working, the numbers (crime statistics 80% of women have encountered a violent assault) are still the numbers.

 

Meaning that some woman in your life may be in the shoes this young woman found herself in.

Some conversations you have to get right, and there is no second chance

• Honey I’m pregnant - Is it mine?
• Dad I’m gay - Have you tried not being gay?
• Do these pants make me look fat? - It’s not the pants!

All joking aside, the wrong response can ruin relationships.

This isn’t nor should it be the face of women’s self defense

So how can I help #500 Rising?  One way might be as a liaison to other men that also want help.

The numbers are still the numbers.  The likelihood of me dealing with the aftermath of a violent assault especially a sexual assault is relatively low.  The likelihood of a woman I care about dealing with the aftermath of a violent assault is 80%

How can I best help the women in my life?

How can we (any of us) help the women we care about if they find themselves in that situation, and they confide in us.

The wrong response can ruin relationships.  The wrong response can make a bad situation even worse.  The wrong response could scar.

So what are some right responses?  What are some best practices for this situation?

• There is no wrong way to survive - if you are alive to tell me the story you did the right thing

• This is not your fault

• I love you, and nothing that happens to you will change that

• It is ok to not be ok

• It is ok to be ok

• The static state is a myth, and you will likely transition through multiple stages of “ok”

• If you don't want to speak to Law Enforcement now (or ever) that is fine.  However, you should probably see a SANE nurse

What is a SANE nurse ?

A Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner is a registered nurse who completed additional education and training to provide comprehensive health care to survivors of sexual assault. 

In order to offer comprehensive care, the role of the SANE includes evaluating and treating the patient in a holistic way, being mindful of both the acute and long-term consequences of sexual violence victimization. The SANE can gather a culturally and developmentally appropriate medical history and a history of the assault, with an essential understanding of the medical and legal implications of both. Gathering this history lays a foundation to offer the patient suitable options in care, which may include forensic evidence collection, testing and treatment or prevention of sexually transmitted diseases and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), pregnancy prevention, and immediate and followup services with community-based sexual assault advocacy, and medical and law enforcement partners. The SANE ultimately provides culturally sensitive, developmentally appropriate, trauma-informed, and patient-specific evaluation and treatment. 

https://www.ovcttac.gov/saneguide/introduction/what-is-a-sane/

• It is ok to not be ok

• It is ok to be ok

• The static state is a myth, and you will likely transition through multiple stages of “ok”

Along those lines, even if you don’t want to speak to law enforcement now, that too may change.  On top of the health aspects of seeing a SANE nurse, SANEs are also prepared to testify in a criminal or civil trial as a fact or expert witness when necessary, and understands the ethical obligations of their testimony and the limitations as well.

Ally is a term that gets thrown around so much that it loses meaning.  Is Disney an ally when they sell rainbow Mickey Mouse ears…but edit out homosexuals and people of color from their theatrical releases and movie posters in China? 

I don't want to pander, I don't want to profit. I want to be helpful, useful to people I love in a community I am not a part of.

The likelihood of me dealing with the aftermath of a violent assault is relatively low.  The likelihood of a woman I care about dealing with the aftermath of a violent assault is 80%

Many of the women I care about may also carry an extra burden.  They are involved in physical culture and train on a regular basis.  

My good friend Randy King is not shy about sharing how the aftermath of an edged weapon attack rocked him to the core.  He was Randy Fucking King the bad ass of Edmonton, how could he possibly get stabbed.  If he is not Randy Fucking King then who is he?

Luckily for Randy he found Rory Miller’s book “Meditations on Violence” and he realized all versions of Randy are human and subject to human physiological, psychological, and emotional responses to the type of stress caused by close interpersonal human violence.

Buy here

In my own life experience I put way too much pressure on myself to win wrestling matches because I came from a wrestling family.  Both my brothers were State Champions.  Wrestling was my nurture and my nature.  That was the noise in my head.  That was the board meeting of Monkeys (the social part of your brain) screaming "they are all going to laugh at you"

All that self created undo pressure did nothing to help me win wrestling matches.  Losing matches made those Monkeys louder.

For women who train, not unlike Randy's knife attack  - the disparity between criminal violence and martial arts training can be devastating.  Also a feeling of I should have been able to stop this (self created undo pressure) could make a traumatic event that much worse, that much more complicated to recover from. 

• There is no wrong way to survive - if you are alive to tell me the story you did the right thing

• This is not your fault

Training on a regular basis improves one’s life in general and increases your probability of survival (no wrong way to survive).  Some sort of action movie Black Widow response is not required - nor expected of anyone.  You survived correct, what you do next is up to you (reclaiming agency)

• This is not your fault

• I love you, and nothing that happens to you will change that

I want to be helpful, useful to people I love in a community I am not a part of.  I can offer perspective from my life experience and training.

As a Police Officer you are expected to deliver death notifications.  Mrs. Smith I regret to inform you…

You are trained how to provide support to someone after devastating information has been shared.

There are crossover principles that can be applied to supporting someone who has just shared devastating information with you.

This information may rock you.  It will most likely cause an emotional response.  You have every right to feel your emotions.  However, right now isn’t about you. Right now has nothing to do with how you feel about what happened.   You can process that later.  Right now is about helping someone you care about deal with a traumatic event.  Practice active listening, be present in that moment, be there for them.

Be their rock.  You may need to scream, cry, plot vengeance any of the spectrum of human responses to a situation like that.  

Be their rock first, then deal with your emotions later. Please - don't misunderstand me - you must deal with your emotions too, but be there for them first.

Train hard, train smart, be safe - be of service to others

Change the numbers

Know your numbers

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Budo Blog.  Writing consistently is kind of a litmus test for me.  If I am firing on all cylinders I have time (and energy to write).  Having time and energy and something you want to talk about sync up is more rare than I like.  So this week I thought I might start with a rant (what is on the top of my mind right now) and work to how this is useful to others. 

Recently we had new candidate testing for the SWAT team.  We experienced a 60% failure rate (about twice as high as previous years).

It was like something from a Navy SEAL movie

Master Chief John Urgayle : 

"SIXTY PERCENT of you will NOT pass this course! How do I know? Because that is an historical FACT! "

New Candidate testing consists of:

Meeting with Command Staff (Myself and the Commander) / Soft Interview

Fundamental Firearms accuracy and safety course of fire

PT Test

    Push Ups

    Sit Ups

    Wall Climb

    2K Row

Elevated heart rate / stress shoot

Scenarios

Except for the exact circumstances of the scenarios the entire test is made known to the candidates weeks in advance.

During the testing process I bounce between station 1 Meeting with Command Staff and station 3 PT test.

Station 1 briefs the candidate on the process and allows us to get to know them a bit.  What is your current assignment?  Where are you from?  What do you do for fun?  Tell us a little bit about yourself type of stuff.

Additional questions I ask

If you had a time machine and could give yourself advice five years ago - what advice would you give?

What do you do on a weekly basis to be a better law enforcement officer?  

    If they pause to think, to dig for an answer I have reservations.  I want to see them counting off a list on their fingers of the multiple things they do on a weekly basis. 

  

Many of the answers were -  I work out on a regular basis.  We would put that answer to the test.

Out of 14 candidates 8 failed

Of those 8:

2 failed the basic firearms skills / safety qualification. 

    What do you do on a weekly basis to be a better law enforcement officer?  

    No one answered - dry fire drills, or I regularly participate in 3 gun competitions to shoot under            pressure.

    Many answered -   I work out on a regular basis.   

For the candidates that passed the basic Firearms skills, the next stop is the fitness room.  There, they are weighed in and instructed on how the fitness testing will proceed.  During the weigh in the Sgt. in charge of this station would ask the candidates how many push ups / sit ups do you need to get done in a minute.

Again, except for the exact circumstances of the scenarios the entire test is made known to the candidates.  Everyone was told what the requirements were several weeks before the test.

If they pause to think, to dig for an answer I have reservations.

Every candidate that did not know that answer off the top of their head failed the fitness portion of the testing process.  They were incapable of preforming the minimum amount of repetitions required to pass.

Of the other 6 that failed:

    1 failed the Push Ups

    4 failed the Sit Ups

    1 failed the 2K Row

If you don't know the reps / time needed to pass how can you possibly train to assure that you pass the test?

If you don't know your numbers you don't know your business

If you are wondering how you would do, you can check for yourself.  Below are links to the tests.  

Cooper Institute Standards

Texas DPS 2K Row Test Calculator

The standard is not very difficult.  60% - what would be a D when I was a teaching assistant for Dr. Lewinski and Mankato State (Go Mavs!).  Basically the tests show if the candidate engages in general physical preparedness activities (as one would assume of a professional law enforcement officer) and is capable of engaging in the higher intensity training required for tactical operations.

Ultimately I don't really care how many sit ups a candidate can do or how fast they can row.  What does concern me is that the candidates knew exactly what was required of them weeks, if not months in advance and at best did not prepare enough or at worst did not prepare at all.

Ok rant over what does this have to do with personal protection?

There is no such thing as cease fire.  If circumstances have created a situation where the threat is not currently attempting to damage you, that is not "peace" that is an opportunity to reload / repair.

The is time to prepare

This is where the Venn diagram of Violence Dynamics (personal protection) and Life Dynamics (enhanced living experience) crosses over.

Preparing during the "cease fire" doesn't have to be / shouldn't be a negative or fearful thing.  The things you can do (probably should do) on a weekly basis to maintain your agency, to ensure you can live an enjoyable independent life are the are the same things you can do to make your self a harder target, take yourself off of some target profiles.

You don't need to be a cross fit champion, underwear model, tactical operator, or all the above

However, if you own a body, you are an athlete in the contact sport called life.

I am a "seasoned" enough Patrol Officer to work day shift.  As such I respond to a lot of lift assist calls.

These calls come from people that stopped preparing for the sport of life.  They no longer have the fast twitch muscle fiber required to recover from losing balance / stumbling.  Once the fall begins they can't move fast enough to get limbs between them and the ground to soften the fall, often time resulting in injury.  Even if they are lucky enough no to be injured from the fall they lack the mobility and strength to get up on their own.  Sadly lying on the ground many times in their own mess until someone notices they haven't been heard from in awhile, or they are able to crawl to a phone and call for help.

These people can no longer live unassisted.  They have lost their agency and their independence

 

You lose 1% of muscle mass per year starting around age 40 unless...

You actively work to maintain / gain muscle mass.  Unless you prepare for the contact sport called life.

I've been bumping my head into a wall.  The same rough concept has come up with law enforcement officers, martial artists, and personal protection practitioners.  I am having trouble articulating it, and even more difficulty finding a way around it / through it.

To help express what I am talking about I will share a conversation with Maija Soderholm.

Maija was helping me with text for the soon to be opened website (stay tuned for details)

Maija - 

It felt focused on peak performance and excellence, associating the acronym with elite cops.

Not sure if everyone is up for being that 'peak' in their performance.. maybe?

It might make someone feel like they were not enough to start

Kasey-

Alternate text suggestions?  This is kind of my blind spot.  I am like why seek out training if you don't want to improve?  If you want to improve why wouldn't you try to be the best?

Maija- 

Because I think people don't want to fail, so if they think they can't do something, they will not even try.

But if you get them INTO the program, then their confidence might build.

You want everyone, from elite cop to grandma, to think "there are people like me who do this, I can do it too"

If they think they can't do something, they will not even try.  This is the heart of what I am trying to work through.

Examples:

Law Enforcement

    An Officer is unconfident with their firearms skills.  They hate qualification because it shines a spotlight on their need to improve.  If they think they can't do something they won't even try.  After they barely squeak past qualification they are happy because right now is the most time they will have before the next qualification which they hate.  

If they think they can't do something, they will not even try.  

Where this becomes a problem is skill in this area is a requirement for their profession and may be the deciding factor in life or death circumstances. 

 What do you do on a weekly basis to be a better law enforcement officer?  

 No one answered - dry fire drills, or I regularly participate in 3 gun competitions to shoot under            pressure.

Inversely - if that same Officer were to practice dry fire drills, seek out an Instructor willing to work with them, basically if they were willing to acknowledge to themselves that they suck at something, however "icky" that feels, they could begin to become sorta good at something.  Sorta of good relieves the unpleasant feeling of spotlight on their need to improve, because they have improved which feels good!  Nothing succeeds like success.  Feeling better results in performing better.  Performing better makes the training feel more rewarding / worthwhile. Consistent training provides even better performance and so on. 

There are people like me who do this, I can do it too

Martial Artists

    A martial artist can hide in fantasy and cosplay.  There are plenty of arts where there is no force on force / pressure test elements at all.  There are ways to participate in any art that avoid force on force / pressure test elements.  That is completely fine, everyone should participate in what they enjoy in the way that works for them.  

Where this becomes a problem is when these practitioners teach.  Especially when they present the unproven  fantasy / cosplay elements that they enjoy as:

• Personal Protection
• Law Enforcement Control Tactics
• Women's Self Defense

Participate in what ever you enjoy in the way that works for you.  NEVER  bet someone else's life on your imagination. 

If they think they can't do something, they will not even try.  

How do you get someone to acknowledge to themselves that they suck at something, however "icky" that feels, so that they can begin to become sorta good at something which feels great?

No one cares if you suck.  More accurately, you are the only person that cares that you suck.  No one else is wasting any energy even thinking about it.  The only people that care is a board meeting of Monkeys in your head (the social part of your brain) screaming "they are all going to laugh at you""

Personal protection practitioners

    There are young fit martial athletes that see all violence only through the lens of their sport.  The news is full of champions being injured or sadly killed when facing criminal violence.  Those that survive do so, for the most part despite their training, not because of it.  

These athletes would benefit greatly from and 80:20 approach as promoted by my friend Randy King.

80 % of your multilayered self defense strategy focused on avoiding, escaping, and talking your way out of violence.  That will greatly enhance the other 20% - the physical aspects that these athletes already excel at.

However, there are also personal protection practitioners that place artificial barriers in their own way.  Relying on weapons for every physical aspect of violence, or justifying academic knowledge of avoiding, escaping, and talking your way out of violence to totally disregard the physical aspects of violence.

If they think they can't do something, they will not even try.  

 

“Self defense starts at washing your hands” -Clint Overland

It is silly to train yourself to prevent the damage caused by a criminal attack if you are unwilling to do simple every day things to prevent the damage caused by illness.  

If you own a body, you are an athlete in the contact sport called life.  You don't need to be a cross fit champion, underwear model, tactical operator, or all the above.  Regardless of your physicality or ability there are simple every day things you can do to make your self a harder target.

Everyone that did not know their numbers off the top of their head failed the test.

How can can you possibly train to pass the test if you don't know your numbers?

How do you get someone to acknowledge to themselves that they suck at something, however "icky" that feels, so that they can begin to become sorta good at something which feels great?

I have questions, but not as many answers as I would like.  However, I do have some ideas on how to find what your numbers are.

The Budo Blog will return in...

What numbers should you know

Train hard, train smart, be safe.

 

Rule of 3

 Rule of 3

I came across the rule of three concept form Chad Lyman - http://code4combat.net/about-us.html

For a human to survive you can’t go three days without food, water, sleep, human contact.  Sounds a lot like the hierarchy of resilience.

Chad suggests that for force professionals to survive  (I’d add for personal protection as well) you shouldn’t go more than three days without combatives training either.

Quick Mankato State math that averages to training around twice per week. 

Oddly enough that seems to be the minimum attendance requirements for promotion in most Judo / Jujitsu schools.

Sidebar - let me step up on my soap box for a moment

I have said it many times, and loudly, but I will say it again - if you are a force professional and you think the six hours of control tactics training you receive a year will be sufficient to survive a violent encounter without being injured, sued successfully, or losing your job, I hope you never have that delusion tested. 

And now...back to the Budo Blog

I’ve been thinking about that rule of 3 a lot and have formulated my own version of it.

Why my own version?  In order to answer that, let’s take a deep dive into the martial arts nerd pool.

Ultimately martial art is a true expression of the self.  Not unlike dance, or other artistic means of physical self expression.  And like dance one must learn the fundamentals well enough to develop their own style.  Every martial artist develops their own art.  They may never give it a name, or teach it to others, but anyone who is any good at this develops a way that works best for them.  This is the heart of Tokui Waza.  Tokui Waza roughly translates as favorite technique.  But more accurately it is about finding what works best for you and getting really good at those things.  As opposed to trying to imitate your instructors who have  vastly different body types,  life experience, and needs than you.  Tokui Waza is also allowing yourself to play with things that don’t work for you.  Because learning how to make your body do difficult things is good for your brain, body (and spirit).  It might not work for you right now, but learning why it’s not working helps you refine what does.   

Rule of 3

Don’t go more than 3 days without training (For Trek nerds this is the rule of 3 prime directive)

Additional Rule of 3 (my own way) directives:

3 Arts

The best martial art (foundation) is one you enjoy and will continue with as part of your lifestyle for your entire life.  Having said that, there is no one perfect / complete art.  Not even Ameridote

Why 3 arts

If the perspective you have of physical confrontation is limited to only one aspect of the interpersonal violence spectrum, your ability to solve problems becomes severely limited.  If you can’t throw hands, you can’t really grapple.  If you can’t prevent yourself from being taken down, nor are you capable of returning to your feet you really can’t really box. Also if all of your perspective is sport based it becomes very difficult to deal with a criminal attack say with a knife or blunt instrument.  

Operational Disciplines, the knowledge necessary to apply skill and experience to interpersonal violence (what the Violence Dynamics Seminar is based on) can be broken in to seven broad categories:

Legal / Ethical

Violence Dynamics

Avoidance (Conflict Strategy)

Counter Assault

The Freeze

*The Fight

After

* The fight, or physical confrontation only consists of 20% or so. The majority of Operational Disciplines, the highest probability of success strategies are geared toward avoiding / preventing physical confrontation.

However, no strategy is perfect all of the time. No matter how good you are at the 80%, physical confrontation is always a possibility. You may have to deal with "The Fight"

The fight consists of:

Striking - Something Boxy

Joint Locks

Strangles

Takedowns - Something Wrestly

Ground Skills

Weapons - Something Stabby / Clubby

Skill in personal protection helps to build confidence and helps to make de-escalation skills more successful. Calm Officers tend to preform better and make better decisions.

Box / Wrestle / Fence

Most Military and Law Enforcement  Academies have historically sponsored boxing, wrestling, and fencing clubs.  It may be called different things at different places (Karate, Judo, Kendo) but some means to provide force on force training in striking, grappling, and weapons has been a universal theme for people receiving education for use of force professions.

3 gyms

People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan.  Your training schedule has to be robust enough to account for the varying amounts of chaos in your life and still get in your minimum effective dose of training - two training sessions per week (rule of 3).  If your school only has class on Wednesday and Saturday, and say your kid has confirmation on Wednesday your are training below minimum effective dose.  Does that school offer training on other days?  Does that school offer training in other arts?  This might be an excellent opportunity to supplement your foundational training with one of the other aspects.  For example if you can’t get to boxing on Wednesday could you go to BJJ on Thursday to make the twice per week requirement?  If your school only offers one art what can you do?  Use multiple schools.

Joining multiple martial arts schools can be very expensive.  However, most schools offer a drop in fee or mat fee for single classes (usually around $10 to $20)  So for the price of going to a movie you could supplement your foundational training and assure that you can train twice a week even if you can’t get to your main school.  Be honest and upfront with the Owner / Instructor.  If you are dropping in multiple times a month you should probably pay them their monthly fee.

Find a tribe that fits your vibe, this is going to be your foundational school.  For the sake of discussion lets say that school is something wrestly.  If that school doesn't offer other aspects of the fight find a school in a reasonable commute that offers something boxy, and another that offers something stabby / clubby

3 people

On top of the mental health benefits of meeting people with similar interests and having face to face interactions, training with at least three people is required to do any type of force on force training.

Finding ways to safely test the entire spectrum of physical confrontation under varying levels of pressure / resistance is absolutely essential to developing the confidence through competence required to make de-escalation skills more successful. As stated before calm Officers tend to preform better and make better decisions. It is hard to stay calm under pressure if you have never been put under pressure in training.

Rule of 3 (Kecker Style) 1 - Train in some sort of combatives at least every 3 days (Twice per week = minimum effective dose)

2- Find an art you love, and supplement it with other arts (best of all worst of none) 3 - Find multiple gyms in your area where you can train to make sure you meet your weekly minimum effective dose

4 - train with enough people (that you trust) so that you can test your skills against varying levels of pressure / resistance.

Train hard, train smart (and often), be safe