Quite an Enrichment

So last night was my first Enrichment night in my new ward. I realized this is the first time I've lived in a ward that doesn't need to have a "get to know you" Enrichment because it's not near a university, there are not really any students, and therefore little turnover. Weird! Also, everyone continues to be so friendly to me. It's made it really easy to feel a part of things. So I turned down an offer for dinner at Brian's colleagues' house to go. That's kind of rude I know to not go when someone invites you to dinner but I had already planned to go to Enrichment. Brian and Elliott still went though.....anyway....the theme for Enrichment was self defense.

I've never taken any self defense classes before. I guess I was expecting to go and sit in a chair and watch some demonstrations, get some ideas on how to defend myself. Instead they got a 3rd degree black belt instructor to come and he brought two black belted men with him. We were all in lines in the gym practicing our kicking and punching for like an hour! It was serious stuff. I'm sore today! Besides just the most effective ways to kick and punch I learned things I'd never thought to do, like exhaling, making a hissing sound when you kick to help you remember to breathe. Also, to yell like a really loud "HAW!" when you kick to scare your attacker. He'll take you a little more seriously if you look him in the eyes, yell, and kick really hard. The other great thing we learned was a no-fail technique to get away if someone has grabbed onto your wrist/arm no matter how hard they are holding onto you. Amazing! Why has no one ever taught me this before? How did I live on the south side of Chicago for two years and never take a self defense class?! Not that I'm beyond being attacked here. About the time we found out we were moving here, a teenage girl was abducted in broad daylight in a Target parking lot and was murdered and dumped in the river. That happened in a cute, upscale suburb 20 minutes from my part of town. After we learned our kicks and jabs we practiced them on the karate men who were wearing practice pads. When we finished that, we all sat down again and the person conducting said Sis. So-and-So had a few words to share with us. This sweet, young mother in my ward proceeded to get up and in front of about 50 women managed to tell us how she was raped by a coworker two months ago. wow. You could tell the emotions were so raw. It was all she could do to calm her sobs down enough to tell us what she wanted to which was basically to decide now that we will fight, even if it's someone we know. She said on the other hand, it was when she stopped fighting that he stopped raping her because then the power trip was over for him. It was so eye opening because for some reason you think that because you're a wife, a mom, that it will never happen to you. So after that, it was time for cookies and punch. Like I could eat cookies after that! Okay...so I did eat two...they were my favorite! Pumpkin chocolate chip!

I've never been to a church activity quite like that one but I'm so glad I did even though I pray I never have to use what I learned.