Aubrey, I love them! I especially love how you got Agnes' fluffy butt!
Daniel, general self defense (martial arts) and women's self defense are two different things. If you can find an instructor who holds women in a high regard, you can get both in the same class. There are several martial arts that do this. The traditional Japanese ones do, such as ninjutsu and jujutsu. Avoid anything "Americanized." You'd think it would be the other way around, but it's not. Americanized sports, such as kickboxing and American Kempo, can be very egotistical. They focus on power combat sports, and a girl isn't going to learn much about the real world. Also avoid anything that advertises with a general bad-assery about it, such as muay thai and krav maga. One thing I loved about studying ninjutsu is that there was a training for women, called kunoichi... not separate, but in addition, to what the men learned. Basically, we learned more than the guys because the ancient masters recognized that women just have certain "powers" that men don't have, while acknowledging that most of us just aren't going to be as strong as most of you. The men aren't allowed this information until they had been training for years, and had passed several tests to prove trustworthiness... to protect the women. It's kind of hard to defend against a man who knows all your tricks.
I highly recommend the Bushidokan Temple over in Sparks for a low-cost family class that will get what you need. They do jujutsu and have a very tight, good community going. I haven't talked to anyone from there in a couple of years, so I'll have to look them up to make sure everyone is still meeting at the same time. The self defense I teach is 1 or 2-class seminars, regarding no-nonsense defense for all women. I teach how to use everything in your purse as a weapon, common sense habits of survivors, how to use everything on your body as a weapon, weaknesses on the attacker's body, the pros and cons of common defense weapons (the biggest mistake women make while carrying pepper spray), physical defenses to the most common attacks, and resources to turn to if she or a friend has suffered an attack. Most of it is stuff I learned while a kunoichi, and right now I don't think there's a similar all-inclusive class offered in Reno. I do it as a service for non-profit groups once in awhile.
Daniel, general self defense (martial arts) and women's self defense are two different things. If you can find an instructor who holds women in a high regard, you can get both in the same class. There are several martial arts that do this. The traditional Japanese ones do, such as ninjutsu and jujutsu. Avoid anything "Americanized." You'd think it would be the other way around, but it's not. Americanized sports, such as kickboxing and American Kempo, can be very egotistical. They focus on power combat sports, and a girl isn't going to learn much about the real world. Also avoid anything that advertises with a general bad-assery about it, such as muay thai and krav maga. One thing I loved about studying ninjutsu is that there was a training for women, called kunoichi... not separate, but in addition, to what the men learned. Basically, we learned more than the guys because the ancient masters recognized that women just have certain "powers" that men don't have, while acknowledging that most of us just aren't going to be as strong as most of you. The men aren't allowed this information until they had been training for years, and had passed several tests to prove trustworthiness... to protect the women. It's kind of hard to defend against a man who knows all your tricks.
I highly recommend the Bushidokan Temple over in Sparks for a low-cost family class that will get what you need. They do jujutsu and have a very tight, good community going. I haven't talked to anyone from there in a couple of years, so I'll have to look them up to make sure everyone is still meeting at the same time. The self defense I teach is 1 or 2-class seminars, regarding no-nonsense defense for all women. I teach how to use everything in your purse as a weapon, common sense habits of survivors, how to use everything on your body as a weapon, weaknesses on the attacker's body, the pros and cons of common defense weapons (the biggest mistake women make while carrying pepper spray), physical defenses to the most common attacks, and resources to turn to if she or a friend has suffered an attack. Most of it is stuff I learned while a kunoichi, and right now I don't think there's a similar all-inclusive class offered in Reno. I do it as a service for non-profit groups once in awhile.