Was woken up this morning at 3:40 AM…dog jumped on the bed.
Just then I was thinkin’ what if I had to clear the house at that moment during an eminent break in or something… Oh boy, I couldn’t even clear my head or get the cobwebs out, that’s how sound asleep I was. I soon realized this wouldn’t be good. I was not sharp at all, forget about my senses and vision was a bit blurred.
Makes you wonder.
Guess I’ll be sleepin’ with 1 eye open from now on…
Unless there is an absolute need I wouldn’t clear the house. I would wake up, figure out what is happening and then (look, listen, obeserve) and determine what needs to happen then.
I would much rather have a defensive position in my room than be creeping around the house and stumbling into 3 guys ripping off my house.
Except in some situations you might have to
Exactly my point…how many times you hear of someone being woken up to a BG in their bedroom…?
And 3 guys clearing out my house ?..It’s On.
Which is why I said this- Unless there is an absolute need I wouldn’t clear the house
It’s your house and your property. Do what you want. Personally nothing in my house is worth getting killed over except another family member. But all of our rooms are on one side of the house.
Get a better dog…one that jumps on your bed is worthless.
One that can clear the house more quickly/effectively than you can.
You send the dog downstairs and there are three guys, you’ll know it.
Outside of that, IG’s advice is too good to dismiss out of hand.
If your first indication of trouble is awakening with an intruder standing over you, you’re probably done for. Just as we try to allow ourselves some distance from a threat (the reactionary gap), we need to try to allow ourselves some time to “OODA” a situation in the home. Alarms, dogs, and architecture can all play a role.
In Jeff Cooper’s home (the “Sconce”), the master bedroom was at the end of a longish hallway. The entry to which had a iron gate arrangement, that could be opened quickly from the bedroom end of the hall but which would force intruders to make lot of noise to defeat. Being a gate, one could ID and engage the intruders through it. I think Cooper was inspired by similar arrangements he had seen during his latin American days. Some of his clients were dealing daily with the probability, not possibility, that they would be targeted by kidnappers or murderers.
On the opposite end of the scale, a thrifty friend of mine, who had neither a dog nor an alarm system, would set up a little free-standing motion detecting alarm unit to cover the hallway to his bedroom each night. Not an ideal situation, but still better than trusting to luck.
Lastly, live in as nice (safe) an area as your finances will permit. I know that criminals are mobile and that this is no guarantee, but it is still a better bet than living in the 'hood.
Locally, we just had an incident wherein a woman was awakened by 4 masked men in her home. One of whom had a gun to her head. They asked the mother who else was in the house and demanded that she keep quiet or they would kill her grandchild (who was sleeping with the woman). She complied and the intruders went to her adult son’s room and shot him. The investigating officers found an AK and dope packaged for sale in the son’s car. Clearly this was some sort of dope-trade related home invasion. It brings up the excellent point of not permitting anyone who is doing stupid and/or illegal things to share your domicile. As hard as it would be to kick a screw-up family member to the curb, their behaviors can endanger the family members who are trying to help (or enable) them.
Rosco
+1. Also, get to know your dog and how it responds to different stimulus.
My GSD/Heeler mix has various growls and barks. I know if she is responding to a cat in our backyard or if she is responding to a person in the yard based on how she sounds. I can also tell if she is worried about an unknown noise that she hasn’t identified yet.
Guys…our dog “JAX” is a 2 1/2 yr. old male German Shepard, weighs 95 lbs. If you think you could get in my home without dealing with him first your kidding yourself. He has 3 obediance titles already and is smarter than most people I know. He likes our bed and that’s OK, but he walks our house hourly at night staying on duty…never the less that has no bearing on me waking and being alert.
I was only going by your description of the incident. If your dog is as you say and he jumps in your bed, I’d say your cool. If your dog jumps in your bed even with a threat…get another (not replace) your current dog.
My heeler will bark if there is a noise within 50’ of my house. If you somehow manage to bypass the alarm I’ll know you’re in my house before you take one step.
If anyone goes beyond that, I’ll hear some significant swearing and noise beyond that as he chomps down on some ass.
PS. I didn’t even have to train him.
True, we went off a bit on a tangent. To bring it back, something to think about in regards to waking up and reaction, part of that will depend on what part of your sleep cycle you are in.
I thought I was all ninja till my 3 yr old son kept on sneaking into bed with us. My wife is worse than me. An alarm system currently and a dog soon for the kids.
Even notice that a dog will sleep in the perfect choke point for house? They just innately seem to be able to figure out what position gives them the maximum control- if you don’t lock them up or let them sleep on a couch.
Had a fire alarm fail once in the middle of the night. Not a bad battery, just failed and the security system picked it up as a fire. I know what you mean about waking up and not being quite sure who I am.
THIS IS SOOOOOO TRUE! I never realized it/looked at it that way
until you just said it. VERY TRUE !
Back about 25 years or so ago, I was awakened by Police doing a search outside the next door neighbor’s house. There had been a domestic incident and word was they were looking for the dad outside. It was a stormy night so not much fun for them. Later after I had gone back to sleep, I was awaken by someone coming down the hallway. (My bed had the head where I could see down the hall.) As I rapidly awakened, I realized I was standing in a squating posture and had my .357 in my hand covering my wife as she returned from getting a drink of water. All automatic, the .357 was in between the mattress and box spring. Scary for both of us…
Another time, I was sleeping early in the night when I just barely heard the doorknob on the bedroom click. At that time I kept a .22 six shooter between the mattress and box spring. Drawing it, I leveled it at the door on the eye level. The door opened slowly. It was my Dad checking in on me, he had a house key.
Moral of the story is I’m a light sleeper and will somehow sense the issue and be at the ready. I could tell more stories of other gun-less incidents like running to the window when a car wrecked outside at night or when the kids or grand kids make sounds and I’m already beating feet to them before complete awareness. YMMV
I had a gut check about 3 weeks ago. My kids (aged 2 and 4) are restless and one or both of them is up at least once a night. My boy just gets up to use the bathroom which is right outside our bedroom door; his younger sister is contained in her crib for a little while longer.
My son threw me a curveball when, instead of doing his business in the bathroom and going back to bed, he flicked on our room’s light switch to talk to us at about 4:00am.
That threw me into all kinds of crazy. I had one hand going for my glasses and the other for the HK while my eyes were busy trying to readjust. I could see just well enough without my glasses to see that it was a very short person in the doorway and that all was well.
This is why it’s so critical for me to have doors that are hard enough to defeat that they’ll make noise when someone forces an entry so I have time to recalibrate. Luckily, our house is laid out such that any intruder would have to go up switch-back stairs to reach us which buys me precious time to react and keeps my family contained separate from the bad guys.
When something goes bump in the night, the bump is usually what saves you.
You guys ever play the game at the range where -upon command- you engage a target and somebody behind you sprints to see how far they can get before you stop the threat? The idea being to show how much distance a person can cover in a short period of time?
I suggest you try the same thing at your home. Throw your entryway open and see how fast you can get to your room to overpower someone. That’ll tell you how quick you need to be able to react if it goes down for real.
More and more bad guys are entering and overpowering occupants first, then cleaning out the place. Mr. Hackathorn had a very sobering discussion with us about that during our last shoot-house training session.
-'bridge
100% agree with gunz. I’d have rolled out of bed, grabbed my AR by the nightstand and waited while I woke up some more and figgered out what was going on.
I forget what our last class’s instructor told us the time element for house clearing was for their departement… I think 2 minutes for every 100 square feet of house? It should take about 20 min to safely clear the average home.
Stonebridge,
Could you share Mr. Hackathorn’s discussion with us?
I can’t even run 10 feet in my house without my GSD mix chasing me down and tripping me up. 
I think I probably do rely on the mutt a bit much though, as an alarm, a deterrent, distraction and as a weapon against an invader.
It’s a good point though, and watching the news you can hear stories just as you describe. Seems the people in the home are often tied up as well.
I usually do a hammer fist to my enemy, the alarm clock.