The lessons of my essay are simply this: talk with your kids, include them in your preps, and listen to them.
My foray into prepping began in 2008, courtesy of my then 10-year-old son. My astute older child noticed how stressed mom and dad were with the rising costs, lowered wages, and cut hours that we were experiencing thanks to the newly developed recession. My son asked if he could put in a garden, a novel idea for my core family unit. He felt the need to help contribute to the family in some way.
I must inject a little background into my story… My brother has been preparing since 2006 so the concept was not foreign to my family. We live rurally and hunting has always been a part of our lives. But despite my attempts at persuasion I could not convince my husband to jump onto the prepping train. Little did I know it would take our kids to convince him.
The first year of gardening was not a success in the typical sense. Our garden bounty needed to be greatly supplemented by local produce auctions. But it did open the door for more preparations.
I’m getting off track here. The story is about my children: I have two sons, currently 13 and 11. They have always been a part of our strategic planning meetings. We feel our children need to know as much as we do about what we have purchased, need to purchase, and would like to purchase. Your kids are going to know that something is going on, it is better to include them than to keep them in the dark. Trust me; if they do not fully understand your situation, they are going to discuss it at school or with their friends. You cannot expect them to notice that you are bringing in pallets of supplies, but not to ask questions about it. Children are curious by nature and that curiosity has led my kids to becoming well educated about some survival topics. Your children also need to know how to use every piece of equipment as well as you do. You owe it to them, as their parents, to ensure that they have all the necessary skills to survive if you are somehow injured or unavailable. Making your kids key elements in your preps not only makes them more desirable, if the need were to arise that you band with another group, but it also makes your group as a whole, superior.
My eldest is still interested in gardening and we have expanded our garden for the third straight year this spring. He is also an avid reader. Along with numerous other genres of books, he is currently reading all the apocalyptic books that he can get his hands on. I read the same adolescent novels that he enjoys. This opens the lines of communication and leads to interesting conversations. Conversations ranging from: Are the teenagers in real-life as ignorant as the teenagers in the books? (He says they are–that is scary if true) How he would handle the situation of surviving on his own? Is he ready to protect himself and his family? Can he live without all the electronic babysitters? (I.e. video games and iPods)
My younger son is the gun enthusiast. He can list more weapon makes and models than my husband, which is saying something. He is more athletic then my older son, but he is also more indolent and stubborn.
Both of our children are required to help in the garden, target practice, and help canning food preservation. They carry in the groceries and help me rotate the shelves. We have raised our children to be contributing members of the family unit. That is not something that can be taught overnight. Nor will it be a lesson easily learned when the times get even more desperate. Because of their hard work, responsibility, and maturity they are rewarded in several forms. They are often the hosts of sleep-overs. Besides the fast that I love having the extra 2-8 kids over, I consider it a form of prepping education. Do you know how much and how often 10 teenage boys will eat? I do. I have needed to increase my food stores because of that reason alone. I also can witness the interaction between the kids. I know which kids have no problem running out in the dark to chase off a stray cat that is threatening our kittens. I know which kids are willing to help in the garden and mash applesauce. I know which one of my sons’ friends treat me with respect. This is all important for when the time comes and my home may become a safe haven for parentless children. I know, it sounds frightening and alarming, but I have come to love some of these kids and would take them in as my own.
I bring up the point about the extra kids for several reasons. First, I consider the sleep-overs to be an essential par t of our prepping training. I need to know that that I can trust my kids with our secrets around other kids. I like to see how the girls and boys react with a good ole’fashioned game of ghost in the graveyard. I also like to make note of the kids that pitch in with the chores and who can be counted on to follow instructions. Secondly, I use the guise of hosting sleep-overs to hide several of my preps in plain sight. Do you know how many kids will come over without proper winter gear? All of them. So it of no surprise that I have numerous pairs of boots, jackets, hats, and gloves stored in my closet. Lastly, tactically their games of hide-and-go-seek outside in the dark along with Nerf gun wars in the house are great practice. Now, I know that most of you are going to scoff at the suggestions that such childish endeavors have any real practical application. But I know exactly which one of the kids are willing to lie silently in a patch of raspberries for an hour hiding from the rest of the seekers. I also know which kids go running screaming into the night at the first hint of movement. My children have learned every hiding place outside and inside. They also know every line of fire that is feasible. That sounds practical to me.
Due to my career in health care, I am well stocked in the band-aids area of beans, bullets, and band-aids. My children have practiced drawing blood and starting IVs on a dummy arm. I need to know that they know how to apply an Israel bandage to me if I am not able to care for myself. As an 11 and 13 year old they are more than capable of performing basic to moderate first aid if the need arises, but only if you have taught them. Recently, my younger son took a spill while I was at work. My eldest child calmly called me and asked for advice. He monitored his younger brother for an hour (until my husband got home and took over) for signs of a concussion or a more serious condition. He checked the reactivity of his pupils and his memory skills. This was the exact advice I received from the emergency room physician when I asked him if I should bring my child in for evaluation. Educational opportunities come every day and around every turn. It is our duty as parents to help our children recognize these occasions and step back and allow them to learn. Talking to your kids is not as productive as talking with your kids.
Another such learning opportunity came about just as our first thunderstorm of the season also came about. I was just walking out of work when my son called to inform me that our power was out. By the time that I arrived home five minutes later, he had learned that a transformer was struck by lightning and that we would be without power for several hours. I took the opportunity to open the door for conversation and teach my kids a lesson; little did I know they were going to teach me one. As we were discussing the different scenarios of a storm situation, we also went over our other tornado and fire procedures. That is when I thought I could throw them a curve ball. I asked them, what if not only the power was out but also the phones? (a common occurrence around our place) No problem, they have their cell phones. Well, what if the cell phones were out also? The first things my sons’ ascertained was that I was referring to an EMP blast. Wow, they are good. Yes, my eldest had been reading One Second After and my youngest watches way too much History and Military channels. They went on to explain that one of them would “stand guard” at the best look out window in the house (but not too close to the window so no one from the outside can see them), while the other locks all the doors and pulls all the blinds and secures the property. Pretty good plan for never having discussed it with them. So now, because I’m mom I’ve got to keep throwing curve balls at them. “What if they knew I was not at work that day but off on a prepping/shopping run an hour away? Dad is 25 miles away for his work too.” No problem. They would continue to switch off look out duty, napping when they could until someone made it home. “But what if we don’t make it home?” They would consume the perishables in the refrigerator first, eating them cold or reheating them over the Sterno cans that we have stored.
Great, so they wouldn’t starve. “But what about if someone came up our driveway?” Besides wanting to hide inside the house they told me they know how to access the weapons and better yet they know how not to use them unless they are fired upon first. Okay, so I was pretty dang proud of them. We went on to discuss other problems, an injury, the pets, picking up the stairway so they didn’t break their necks in the dark. Now, for the real kicker. What if they weren’t home when this happened? Hmmm, Yes! I stumped them for a moment. They immediately said they would leave school and head for home. “But how would I know that they were even allowed to leave school?” They hadn’t thought of that. They developed a route for making it from school to my work (less than ½ mile away) and we would walk home together (a mile). They would try to convince another sibling pair that lives close to us to travel together with them. “But, what if they do not allow the grade school children to be dismissed?” My eldest is in the middle/high school located right next door to the grade school. We discussed how the eldest would go and try to convince the younger son’s teacher to allow him to released into his care. If the elder son was not successful he was not to leave the grade school without his brother. If they do not meet me at the hospital in a timely manner, I would travel the route (backwards) and pick them both up. By this time my husband was home and he was upset that I would not immediately leave work to gather our children. That sounds great in theory but our emergency procedures do not allow for staff to leave the building. I realized that an EMP is not quite the same as a tornado warning but how many of the staff members are going to realize what is happening immediately? It would be more suspicious if I took off running, screaming the sky is falling, immediately.
The conversation turned to other scenarios and crisis types. They talked about filling the bathtubs for additional water and how they can get into our locked house. They made their point though. They are better prepared than most of the adults I know. That is a reassuring notion for a mother to carry with her. Times will be difficult enough; I will be worrying about my children every minute. But can you imagine how much harder it would be for my husband and I to function if our children were not well prepped? I’m sure some of you are saying that you don’t want to unduly frighten your children. I agree. During our discussions my youngest son expressed some fears about being able to carry out his duties and “pulling his weight.” It is better to openly address these fears now before they become a reality, rather than to shelf them for a rainy day. No, I do not want my kids to live their lives in fear nor do I want them to grow up too fast. I explained to my sons how we in the medical profession practice and practice every emergent situation hoping that we never have to experience them. I would have been perfectly happy never performing CPR on an infant during the course of my career, but when that time came I am glad that I practiced that skill. It is just like training for a sport, if you don’t practice you cannot succeed. The same is true for prepping.
Another skill my sons are extremely proficient at is shooting our weapons. I realize that almost everyone on here would have multiple reasons against me touting the benefits of a .22 [rimfire] pistol. Some of them I would agree with, some I would not. Our .22 pistol has allowed our sons to become extremely good marksmen. I don’t know about you, but I cannot afford to go out and shoot up a box of .45 or .357 cartridges. The pistols are small and light, easily manageable for their smaller hands and bodies. They are not scared of the recoil. Those are all important features for learning the skills of handling a firearm. The same can be said for the .22 rifle. If I can teach my children inexpensively, safely and confidently how to handle both a pistol and rifle and that is an indispensable skill. Master the .22 and you can master anything. My eldest son proved that lesson this past year by shooting his first deer at over 120 yards, walking, with an open-sight .30-30. That is pretty impressive.
The simple, lowly .22 pistols and rifles have taught our kids how to handle a gun safely and how to hit their target accurately. Tell me another weapon that offers that without that same result without costing a fortune. Given the option of a .22 pistol or no gun at all, that is a silly question. And yes, a .22 pistol can kill all manner of beasts; just ask most local farmers that use a .22 to put down cattle. It works, but only if you can hit your target. My coworker was laughing at my choice in firearm when I purchased my Walther P22 (an excellent gun, BTW) saying that it was a waste of money and has no stopping power. My reply was simply this, “I can afford to target practice daily and fire thousands of rounds through it. Better to hit my target with all of my 10 rounds, then to have a larger caliber pistol that I cannot afford to target practice with but once a year and miss with every shot.” Pistol shooting is a skill and an art that cannot be learned in an afternoon with a couple of magazines worth of ammo.
Of all the skills my sons have learned through these difficult times, the most important is the value of being fiscally responsible. My kids rarely ask for toys, treats, or presents. They would rather have a used book or better yet an afternoon all together as a family playing board games. They know the value of a dollar (less every day) and they respect what it means not to spend the money when you don’t have it. Often when I ask them what they would like to do for a special occasion or afternoon together, they tell me they would like to play a board game or bake bread together.
What is going to happen to all of those kids that cannot live without their parents spending a fortune on them? You know what kids I mean, the ones that get a $60 video game for cleaning up their own room. Really? It is their mess they should not be awarded for that, they shouldn’t have to be asked. And yes, it is really that bad. Or the girls that I had the privilege of witnessing this past weekend, strutting around a band competition wearing a mini-skirted tube dress and heels and then throwing themselves to the floor and kicking and screaming when their results were not posted fast enough. I am not making this up, I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I hadn’t witnessed it with my own eyes. (And for the record they were 13 years old.) My kids are not perfect; I will never claim they are. But I know that in whatever situation we are faced with, be it tomorrow, next month, or in a year, or never, that my kids will be responsible and mature. I know I will be able to count on my kids to be able to survive TEOTWAWKI, high school, or the real world with confidence and dignity. Please talk with your kids, start right now because a family that preps together survives together.