Advise please re prepping

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Prepnan
Posts: 0
Joined: Tue May 09, 2017 3:30 pm

Advise please re prepping

Post by Prepnan »

Hi all,
I am just an ordinary Joe Bloggs who likes to be prepared for any event. I must take after my mum who began to 'prep' during the cold war and continued from there on. She would always like to have enough food etc in case of any event. I have been reading fictional books on EMP's, etc and wonder do others really believe something like this is going to happen.
My family think i am quite mad and wasting my time. I do believe that it is likely that we will be hit by either an CME or EMP especially the way the world is now and the instability within governments.
I am an older woman with kids and grandkids and i don't want to be in a position where something happens and i cant do anything. I have been systematic in my prepping for food in that i buy food with lengthy sell by dates and have them stored in date order. I prob have about 2 months worth of food/water for 4 adults and 4 children. A lot of this has been done by stealth, ie insisting that we have plenty of water butts in the garden. Have planted lots of herbs predominately those with healing qualities. Slowly taking over the large shed of my husbands with good storage boxes of food. I have plenty of batteries, candles, matches, lighters and various other supplies and have also made a faraday box in which i have a solar powered charger and other bits and pieces. I have a bug out bag ready in my car at all times. I think it is only sensible anyway

Realistically i don@t have anywhere to bug out to. I live in a small house in the middle of a small town. Am i wasting my time like my husband insists. He really believes that if "TSHTF" that we would not survive at all and would be better of dead. If i am going to die i want to go down fighting as they say.
KR to all
Prepnan
pseudonym
Posts: 4550
Joined: Wed Jul 27, 2011 10:11 am
Location: East Midlands

Re: Advise please re prepping

Post by pseudonym »

Hello and welcome to the Forum. :)


Most of us have been ridiculed by the ones we love at some time or another, only to pull out some item from our preps to assist them more than once.

#Smugface :mrgreen:
Two is one and one is none, but three is even better.
Arzosah
Posts: 6323
Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2012 4:20 pm

Re: Advise please re prepping

Post by Arzosah »

Hello prepnan, good for you!

The stuff you've already prepped is good for lots of emergencies that happen all the time - a power cut, a broken water main, a bad bout of flu, a bad winter, all sorts. I'm impressed you've managed to store so much water. And I totally agree on planting medicinal herbs - houseplants as well, like aloe vera.

None of us in the UK really do bugging out (unless there's a house fire, in which case its about staying with relatives after an initial night in a local B&B or similar.

So, what about:
- your first aid box?
- heating, if something happens during a cold spell?
- practising skills? Like, processing those herbs, learning how to light a fire.
- making sure everyone knows where to go when something happens? Don't know how old your grandchildren are ...
- since you'd be staying at home, what are your neighbours like? Do some of them have skills you lack? Even a neighbourhood watch scheme can be a start on getting people to look after the area.

You're doing so well already, thats why I'm saying stuff like that - I'm only just at the "neighbours" stage myself.
Yorkshire Andy
Posts: 8735
Joined: Thu Oct 03, 2013 4:06 pm

Re: Advise please re prepping

Post by Yorkshire Andy »

Welcome

How do you plan to cook food? Purify water in a "grid down" situation be it loss of gas or electrical grid?

Have you got safe things to burn candles in / on?

Suitable fire fighting kit?

If kids are involved think £1 shop solar garden lights far safer
If your roughing it, Your doing it wrong ;)

Lack of planning on your part doesn't make it an emergency on mine
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Deeps
Posts: 5797
Joined: Sun Nov 09, 2014 8:36 pm

Re: Advise please re prepping

Post by Deeps »

[quote="Prepnan" He really believes that if "TSHTF" that we would not survive at all and would be better of dead.
Prepnan[/quote]

Welcome to the forum, you seem to be a good way along the prepping route and there has been plenty of advice already. The one thing to consider about a SHTF situation (not that it looms large on my horizon) is that whether you like it or not you might survive whether you want to or not so why not spend a little bit of what you can spare on it. I'll even toss in the 'insurance' analogy, I've no plans to burn my house down but I still have building insurance. We shop around and try and do it as cheaply as we can, I have the same approach to my 'basic' preps like food and water. As someone who is (more was now really, I don't get away as much as I'd like) into outdoor pursuits I already had a ton of camping type stuff so that side was well covered. We find our own level, there are aspects of prepping that I have no interest in, you don't need to buy into anyone else's dream/fear of a doomsday (although its good for inspiration).

Enjoy prepping, as somebody who's other half wasn't that keen and is still not exactly fully onboard I've found it useful to have things that make her life easier, after all, she'd be along for the ride anyway. Its taken a while but Mrs Deeps is more accepting of my 'nuttiness' but its been a journey, she's the gardener so I've been more proactive in helping there, in that respect its been mutually beneficial. If your other half likes a wee pint you can suggest homebrew for example, patience is also part of getting the family onboard.

Figure out what works for you and yours, have a neb around the forum, there's loads of stuff been discussed, youtube can be handy too but some on there seem quite 'slick' so don't get too bogged down with being able to (for example) start a fire with flint and steel when you've got a hoofing big supply of lighters/matches, there's no 'one size fits all'.