Pine Belt employees, family members learning self-defense skills
Veronica Staten was excited to hear that Mississippi Power was offering self-defense classes in the Pine Belt Division.
When she learned the classes were also available to family members, she signed up her two daughters (Christi Green and Kelly Neldon) and two granddaughters (17-year-old Caroline and 16-year-old Cela).
They are among about 30 women going through the self-defense classes being held in Hattiesburg and Laurel. Two sessions, roughly 90 minutes each, have been held in each of the locations the past two weeks, with the final classes set for next week.
“The classes have been phenomenal,” said Staten, a customer service representative in Hattiesburg. “The concept of the class is to keep it simple and master what we learn.”
Chris Odom, security investigator in the Pine Belt Division, organized the training and enlisted instructor Chad Pittman, a black belt in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, to help teach the techniques.
“We are giving them the skills to survive the fight, get away and not be victimized,” Odom said. “We’re not teaching them techniques to stay and fight an attacker. We’re teaching how to disable the attacker long enough to get away. We hope they never have to use them, but we want them to be prepared just in case.”
Among the basic lessons are the three things that set the stage for an attack – an opportunity, a victim and an assailant – and the importance of not putting yourself in precarious situations.
“The training has taught me simple things like how to get myself out of a situation,” said Sonyia Grice, a Pine Belt Division Senior Assistant who is attending the classes with her daughter Katelyn, a student at Jones County Community College. “It has taught me to be aware of my surroundings and stay calm. I highly recommend the training.”
The groups also learned the four things that generally happen in an attack – the assailant identifies a victim, subdues you, exhausts you, and then assaults you.
That’s why flight is emphasized more than fight, because struggling with an attacker generally just contributes to exhaustion of the victim.
“We’ve learned that we are stronger than we realize and it doesn’t necessarily take muscle,” Staten said. “They’ve taught us to use our core body strength and the importance of establishing a base and how to get up. Who knew that was so important, but it’s huge. Once you’re down, an assault is pretty much a given, but if you can get up and get on your feet, you have a chance.”
Pittman and Odom are teaching a variety of techniques and drills that are applicable for different scenarios.
One such move is to slap the attacker’s ears with cupped hands. That can cause disorientation, pain and enough distraction to be able to flee. Another was called “shrimping,” a technique to help you move and deny an assailant during an attack.
Grice noted a technique if being held against a wall and being choked.
“I am to grab the attacker’s arm near the wrist and pull one of his fingers down as hard as I can to make him release my neck,” she said. “I then duck down and get away as fast as I can. The ultimate goal is to get away.”