I consider myself an avid prepper but it doesn’t drive my life. I treat it like insurance, something I have to do but would prefer not to. Like everything else I have evaluated the risk and decided that it is a threat worth considering. I then spend time finding the best deal to maximise my available cash but I want to ensure that the insurance covers my needs. Prepping is bloody expensive, even for the minimal cover although I have chosen to go for full cover. So now I spend a sizable portion of my income on preparing for an event but still spend money on the here and now so I can live at the moment. In my evaluation I believe the biggest risk at the moment is societal collapse and as this takes the same amount of preparation as a meteor impact or a EMP then by default I have prepared for those as well. This means I have an extensive list of items I want and I’m working towards that.
Sadly the biggest risk to me and mine I see is that other people, who have not prepared, will expect to help themselves to our supplies. I’ve looked at this long and hard and can only see so many ways of dealing with this and in my discussions with others on this site as well as others I don’t see many alternatives to this issue.
The options available are simple;
- Bug Out at the start of an event
- Relocate prior to an event
- Set up a fortress in your home
- Keep your head down and ride it out
Bug Out at the start of an event
I don’t have anywhere to go that is mine so I don’t want to join all the other refugees on the road and get stuck in traffic within a few miles or get held up because I have viable transport so I won’t be looking at this. The risk is too great for my family for me to risk. Only if I had my own refuge which was stocked would I do this and I would be carrying the minimum I could with me.
Relocate prior to an event
This would be my preference. Find somewhere in the middle of nowhere where I could acquire 5 to 10 acres and set up a small homestead. Because of planning laws I may have to live in a caravan or a tent until I could build my own home. I would ensure that I have the materials stored to make the build. It may not be as good as a built home but such is life in the UK. I would try and make it far enough away so I won’t get visitors but close enough I could make it in a couple of hours in a car or on motorbikes and a day or two on pedal bikes.
Set up a fortress in your home
This option is impractical for most people. No location is 100% secure and unless you home is out of the way where you can have a clear fire zone you will be subject to firebombing and invasion by desperate people. If you have the space and the option there are several techniques you can use to improve your chances of survival from traps to barricades.
Keep your head down and ride it out
This sounds the easiest but is not. Your goal is to keep out of everyone’s way and make your home look deserted and uninteresting.
Needs must
At this moment I do not have the funds to purchase any land never mind a new homestead which is my preferred option. Maybe some time in the future but not now. This puts the first two options out of my reach. The third is impractical in my area and it would be a serious mistake to think otherwise. I would guess most people in the UK would have the same issue.
So it is keeping our heads down. At first you would have to be the Grey Man and blend in until enough people have left or died so when you disappeared it wouldn’t be suspicious. Then you need to retreat into your home and hole up until the others do the same. This means I need enough food, water and sanitation to ensure that I can remain hidden. Only coming out at night to gather more food from the cache and dispose of the waste. It defines what I need to purchase for my home and what I need to put in my caches.
Because it relies on stealth rather than force I need to ensure that my defences are static and look natural rather than an obvious security barrier. I have to prepare this now as well. As my final defensive purposes I also need those to be stealthy so I am looking at some silent, or quiet, weapons for the last ditch defence. No point in keeping your head down for months and then blowing it all away with a fire fight if you have an option.
From the above you can see why I have decided the way I am going survive an event. I’m now preparing for that event and to plans I have put in place are being refined as circumstances change.
Of course, I could win the lottery, or the economy could take off or we could be invaded by aliens. That would require different plans and I would revisit my plans as those events were identified.
At the moment though I’m preparing for society collapse, the slow collapse of society with the associated chaos and violence around me and the return to a more sustainable way of life.
That’s my reasoning, thoughts and plans. Hope they make sense to you as I suspect most of us will be in the same situation.
Ditto… more or less the same for me. I have places to go… BUT it al depends on the circumstances that happen as to what part of the plan goes where… Bit like a jigsaw, we can see what the end result is supposed to be and that is what we’re aiming for but theres a lot of possibilities in its final accomplishment.
An excellent realist point ov view SD.
Sharing thoughts like this is what makes this site so interesting to me.
I agree with your reasoning. I am adopting pretty much the same strategy, although I do have more than one alternative BOL.
Societal degeneration is my most feared scenario. It is also the most likely.
I agree with Lightspeed SD – a really good, honest post and I think you hit the nail on the head with it perfectly. I see exactly the same things and are planning in similar way. Could I ask (not just you perhaps SD, but anyone reading this), how have you got your wife/girlfriend/partner involved. I think my wife thinks I’m losing the plot a little. She refers to my evolving preps as my ‘government thing’. I try to explain to her to look around and consider what may be, but it’s not happening at the moment and I find myself getting a little frustrated at times. Any advice?
Well everyone is different but I handles the OH and kids by explaining what I was doing and why. They seen the logic and treat it like my hobby. The keep OPSEC, which is the important bit and I make sure they are covered in my plans. I also make sure that they know where things are and what to do in an emergency. They humour me and it works out OK. If I arrange a camping trip of training they usually do it but as they grow older they have their own lives to lead. Not as good as if they were fully involved but you have to accept things. The biggest issue I have is with their friends. Kids are curious and they see things. I put away what I can but they see full shelves and comment. To my kids it is normal. They don’t see much but you can’t hide everything. The most important thing is to maintain OPSEC and get them to understand what they are expected to do in an event. This covers usual family emergencies as well so you can sell it to them as that. If someone got run over or was ill. Do this, back home and wait, or whatever.
If you get that, and you should, then it is just your hobby.
I am an empty-nester, so it has been a little easier for me with no small children around. Also, I am not at the same level of preparedness and many of the other members of the SUK community, so my prepping has not yet reached the stage of being intrusive to my family’s lifestyle.
Although my kids have now left home, self reliance, prepping and survival skills were engrained in them as they grew-up. They are now independent of me on a daily basis, but now have their own Survivor mindsets and attitudes in place…. that leaves me free to create contingency plans and provisioning for them to use if we need to re-group in response to a crisis.
Getting my partner involved was fairly easy. We lead a very active outdoor life and much of the kit I have assembled appears an extension of that lifestyle. I think she sees my activity as slightly eccentric and obsessive, but harmless. She humours me, besides, she finds it useful to know our cache of provisions is there whenever we suddenly run out of rice or flour or sugar in the kitchen!!!
That’s the way I did it, but I guess that as with all things in relationships, what works for one family will not work for another.
Hopefully you’ll get a number of diverse replies to your question from the SUK community, and these may plant some seeds of ideas that will work for you.
Good luck