Presentation from Appendix Carry in Unorthodox Positions

Here comes another important tip from the Personal Defense Network. Appendix carry is a very popular way to carry a defensive firearm. And most people know that I'm a big fan of it. In fact, most of the time that I'm carrying a J frame for personal defense, I'm carrying it in appendix carry with a belly band. Now that presents some special situations when we're in unorthodox shooting positions.

We need to be very aware of the fact that we're probably going to be covering ourselves during presentation, and keeping our finger off the trigger becomes incredibly important. Now, some people don't like appendix carry and this may be one of the reasons they don't like appendix carry. We may also see situations where you don't train in appendix carry realistically, or some instructors won't let you train, some ranges won't let you train realistically with appendix carry. Very simply because you are going to be covering yourself. You don't have to practice this live.

You can practice it with a dry gun. But make sure that you do practice it and be realistic about the fact that you are covering yourself in the extreme, critical incident situation where you're going to be scared, you're going to be rushing, and you really need to be disciplined about having your finger off the trigger. So if I put myself into a situation, for example, where I've fallen down on the ground onto my stomach, and I'm carrying appendix, I'm gonna need to recognize that threat and come back in to grab my gun. When I do, obviously this gun right now when it comes out of that holster and is pointed down at my legs past my mid section, I'm going to be orienting it just like I would if I were coming off the hip, but there's no way to avoid the reality that this gun at this moment is covering a lot of vital stuff including my femoral artery maybe on the left side maybe on the right side. As I come up, now I'm clear.

I'm pointing at the ground, I orient. I extend touch and press. At this point I can come back in, maintaining my position in the high compressed ready. Assessing my environment. And then if I need to, I can go back to the holster.

And again, this is a two handed procedure. As I go back into an appendix carry belly band holster. And I want to be sure that I'm not covering myself any more than I absolutely have to, or at all if possible. So I come back in with the gun pointed out, I'm going to use my thumb to clear this concealment garment. Use my other hand to open up the actual holster area, go back into the holster and retrieve replace my concealment garment.

Now at this point, I might decide not to be concealed to leave this gun exposed. If I wasn't sure if there was still another threat or if I thought that the police officers were gonna arrive and I wanted to make sure that they could see the firearm and my hands were clearly away from it. Anytime that we're dealing with, the any unorthodox shooting position from appendix carry, we wanna be aware of this issue of covering ourselves. If I go to a seated position, again, same thing. The gun is now covering me with this small two and a half inch J frame revolver.

It is pointed at my body. When I put my hand on it, I need to keep my finger off the trigger. I'm gonna recognize the need to shoot. I'm gonna reach down. In the case of appendix carry, unlike hip.