# your reason for prepping?



## urbanprepper (May 15, 2012)

Hey Everyone,

I was just wondering what made each of you get into prepping?

Personally, i lived in the south during hurricane Katrina and Wilma, and was without power for 10 days - 2 weeks for each, and was shocked at how quickly people would fight over gas, food, booze etc. As i got older, i have done more research and learned more and now i am concerned with our economy and our oil dependencies (and the general chaos that would ensue)

I am just into my 30's and would say that i have been getting prepared for 5 years or so, slowly building up food, water and knowledge. 

So, my question again, what got each of you into this mindset?

Cheers,
Urbanprepper


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## weedygarden (Apr 27, 2011)

*If it happened once, it could happen again!*



urbanprepper said:


> Hey Everyone,
> 
> I was just wondering what made each of you get into prepping?
> 
> ...


My parents were both born in the 1920's and I have heard stories about how desperate they could be for something to eat, in spite of living on farms.


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## db2469 (Jun 11, 2012)

Urbanprepper....the reasons: economic collapse, war, pandemic, in that order of likelyhood...food storage is number one because hyperinflation and the subsequent panic will cause food shortages and cause what food is available to be VERY expensive...
DB


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## BillS (May 30, 2011)

We're preparing for a complete economic collapse. I see that as a 100% certainty. The Fed has been borrowing money at artificially low interest rates and creating whatever money they can't borrow. It's only a matter of time before we have hyperinflation like Germany had in the 1920s.

Real inflation is about 10%. The rest of the world that uses the dollar as the reserve currency is being robbed by inflation. A number of countries with large economies are taking steps to trade with each other in their own currencies.

The eurozone is collapsing. When it's all over it will probably take the whole world's banking system with it. The derivatives market is estimated to be a quadrillion dollars. The dollar will die. We'll have hyperinflation. Federal, state and city governments will go bankrupt at all levels. We'll have anarchy. I think 90% of the US population will die. There will be no working utilities: no electricity, no city water, and no natural gas. Therefore we have food and water, guns and ammo, kerosene heaters and stoves, flashlights and candles. We'll be using toilets made from five gallon buckets lined with garbage bags with toilet seats that snap-on and use kitty litter to cover the smell. I see all this happening later this year. I don't see how it can go past 2013.

Here are some links for those who haven't seen them before:

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-03-26/home/31239106_1_currency-international-trade-dollar


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## db2469 (Jun 11, 2012)

BillS...that's the way I see it as well although I doubt it will be this year....it's an election year!
DB


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## db2469 (Jun 11, 2012)

Of course, I should have added that in NOV this year we'll all have to go through that terrible gridlock again to raise the debt ceiling and make those drastic automatic budget cuts! Yikes!
DB


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## TheAnt (Jun 7, 2011)

I want to live in freedom -- independent of others or government. Then I had children and I wanted the same and more for them.


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## hillobeans (May 17, 2012)

I think it was after reading Lucifer's Hammer about 5 years ago when I first started thinking about getting prepared. What I prepare for mainly are earthquakes, since I live in Portland and it seems likely that we'll experience one in my lifetime.


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## timmie (Jan 14, 2012)

my family has canned and frozen food for as long as i can remember. i guess it just came easy and natural to me . i have 3 girls and only 2 of them are really into the canning thing. my oldest daughter has children and a grandchild. she feezes a lot of her stuff.i guess since i really enjoy this time of year with canning,i really get into it. for my family. i also help teach a lot of our friends how to can and actually help them.


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## BlueShoe (Aug 7, 2010)

I don't prep. I started to, but I quit. I simply believe the chances are that it won't matter for me. In the beginning when the gravity of what we have to lose as a society started settling in on me I realized just how much we have to lose here in America. I started to prep and was worried.

Later as I became accustomed to divorcing myself from the things I used to value under the American system of values, I interpreted the message to be that there would be no societal crash and possibly no further currency crash. I have since determined that the message is that there will be more of the crash, but my outcome will be the way it is regardless of what I do. I have a little food and supplies from back when I did prep. I have no water and no fuel reserves besides a full tank of fuel in a car. I don't trap, hunt or prep. 

I can lean toward being extremely thrifty in lifestyle, so a prepping lifestyle is still attractive to me. I'm a protective individual and rely heavily on honesty in life. I intend to one day lead a life on a piece of property where I have room to pursue the lifestyle.


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## Ration-AL (Apr 18, 2012)

i've always been into survival, but was always geared towards just surviving in nature, while not anti-gun i never really saw the need for them and owing one never even crossed my mind, simply being able to survive in various wilderness environments with the most basic of tools was enough for me and the thought of wild animal attacks didn't bother me, as how often does that happen to fully grown people demonstrating proper back country travel techniques ? very very rarely......

over the years ,growing up, i became more aware of the fragility and the state of the world we have created , and that made me mindful of what could potentially happen, but i still wasn't quite ready to become a "prepper" , as it was still pre-9/11 at this time and things were going good for us, so the fragility was apparent but the possibility not so much, so 9-11 happened and our country started to change in a number of ways, i'm not talking about the war in Afghanistan but the war in America, the war on our economy, the war on our civil rights, the war on the middle class, and just in general the war on the american people.....so watching all of this happen made the possibility very real to me, bail out after bail out, good honest people losing their homes while scum bags who do nothing still suckle from the teet of our federal government and our government not doing anything to stop it,the slow removal of our gun rights,right to protect ourselves and the rights of our very privacy.....

B.Franklin


> They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.


soooo, all of this was going on but i was stretched for cash like the rest of the nation and i was too busy enjoying my lifestyle to really want to change anything, but you know i don't know what it "IS" really, but i just felt this under-current happening in America , whether it be the quite whispers in dark corners talking of the in coming doom or if it be the off hand slightly dark jokes that we're all going down, i just got the sense that we're all feeling this and though we don't want to talk about it or admit it, i feel as if most of the whole nation is waiting for the shoe to drop , kind of like an incoming divorce, some deal with it various ways, some freak out quit their jobs and never go outside again, others accept it and make preparations for the life after divorce then pick up and move on and others just ignore it until it hits them upside the head and knocks them out, but in all of those case they all knew it was coming on some level.......

so long story short i got a few guns and am slowly getting more militant because that is whats called for , i am learning to protect myself from the most dangerous predator on the planet....you guys, other people , i am saddened that i even have to be here and have to learn about this stuff , but i see no other way of preparing for whats we all know is coming....

again i don't really know, i just feel this is where things are heading and don't really see it going any other way.

my SHTF scenarios
1. personal SHTF, lost job, injured, sickness ect..
2.economic collapse and/or hyper inflation 
3. political/civil unrest, the polarization of the american people themselves 
4. pandemic 
5. what else do you really need to prep for? the above should cover most everything that could go wrong.......
1,000000². EOW scenarios , asteroids, volcano's , dinosaurs and aliens


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## Tweto (Nov 26, 2011)

What a good question.

I don't remember ever not prepping. In fact when I started prepping it wasn't called prepping. It's been 40 years of doin it. I think my grandparents put the bug in me, they went throught the great depression and had hundreds of stories to tell, they always had cash around, did not trust banks, a garden, full pantry, and lived without debt.


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## paguy (Jun 8, 2012)

My reason for prepping is that I have always from the time I was a young child followed the moot"Be Prepared". I am a firm believer in being ready for anything at any time.


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## urbanprepper (May 15, 2012)

Thanks for all the posts everyone, always kinda interesting to see other peoples thoughts.

As i was thinking, being outdoors has always been a love of mine, and funny enough, my parents and 2 older brothers used to camp all the time, i was born, and they all stopped. Now i'm the one who goes out in the summer and camps on his own!

I had an interesting talk with a local army supply store, looking for another BoB bag, and said "i want a bag, for roughly 3 days of..umm..camping" the gentleman behind the counter laughed, and said "its the same thing i tell my ol'lady...camping!"


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## tugboats (Feb 15, 2009)

urbanprepper said:


> Hey Everyone,
> 
> I was just wondering what made each of you get into prepping?
> 
> ...


My "prepping" started over 50 years ago. We took a long bike ride with our rifles, bows and a couple of sandwiches. I got a flat on my bike and had to push that thing home. I cut lawns, mucked stalls and threw hay to save enough money for a repair kit, tools, innertube and a pump.

I have always planned to best any bad situation from that point on. My first wife ( gone to the happy hunting grounds) was raised LDS. She was not comfortable until we had an adequte food supply. I never even thought about it. I just enjoyed knowing that I had 2 months, then three months, then a 1/2 year, then a year of basics on hand. When we had a short term family crisis we survived just fine.

The War Department (the second and best wife---if she is reading this) originally thought I was a bit nuts when she saw my preps. Now she wonders why she ever married a man with only one years worth of preps.

On a serious note; The sense of satisfaction in the knowledge that your family will be fine for an extended period of time is priceless. This was all done one step at a time.


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## BillM (Dec 29, 2010)

I want to provide my children and grand children an oppertunity to survive the coming caticlisim. Once this is done I can happily die in peace.


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## Emerald (Jun 14, 2010)

My Grandparents helped raise me and my brother. (Till mom got married and I became the youngest daughter of 6 girls haha) They lived through the "Great Depression" I heard the stories and watched Gramma can and saw the pantry full of the jewel colored jars and the jars of chicken that could be popped open and with a few things have a warm bowl of the best chicken soup ever. In minutes. 
My Aunts and Uncles were mostly farmers and I would spend summers at the farm and had chores and knew exactly where my food came from. Their root cellars were always cold in the summer when you needed to cool off and their pantries also had the beautiful arrangement of jars. 
While I sure could have more stuff put by I also know that I have the knowledge and means to grow most of my own veggies right now and since I am a huge heirloom grower I could keep most of my seed stocks and use them as trade items.
While I hunt for food (venison and rabbit and pheasant are favorites) I also can forage and collect things that most will walk by.. I have learned to cook them too. 
But where we live tends to lose power quite often and we have had storms of all kinds rip thru and put us out of power etc. for over a week.. from ice to thunder to just high winds. I could see it going on for a lot longer. I can also see it coming that you have a choice.. buy food or keep your home..


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## pixieduster (Mar 28, 2012)

Growing up moving aroung the country we have weathered snow in's, hurricanes, floods, etc. Katrina gave us 7 weeks with no electricity, bad tap water, and tons of relatives with a non existant home. (As in gone from the foundation). But we really did well. Grandpaw loves to cook, grandmaw helped watch kids, me and hubz worked 18 hour days for the first 6 weeks plus got property cleaned up. I did some prepping before it hit and that's what kept us comfortable and able to provide for everyone. The biggest challenge was getting the other family members home after living on the road for weeks.


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## tac803 (Nov 21, 2010)

Bottom line, I don't want to be dependant on somebody else taking care of my family if something happens. I don't see it as anybody else's job to make sure that we are taken care of, fed, and protected. I truly feel sorry for the people who live day to day blissfully unaware, not even contemplating what might happen. When something bad does happen, they are the angry ones, standing there with expectant looks waiting for somebody to step in and take care of their every need.


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## db2469 (Jun 11, 2012)

Good post Tac803...I agree!
DB


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## mojo4 (Feb 19, 2012)

I only started about a year ago. I have always been a gun nut but I started watching the Walking Dead and Falling Skies and I realized if something terrible happened (which could include zombies and hostile aliens!!) Me and my family would be well armed and starve pretty quickly. So I decided to start storing food. I now have around a year's supply and between that and a large garden we will be fine. Now I'm refining my planning and finishing stocking up on odds and ends. Were going bug out location shopping next week so hopefully that goes well. If you get motivated things happen fairly quickly and I'm glad to be here for all the good advice.


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## Tribal Warlord Thug (Jan 27, 2009)

well said Tac803...like db, i agree with 90% of what ya just said.......this "I truly feel sorry for the people who live day to day blissfully unaware, not even contemplating what might happen. When something bad does happen, they are the angry ones, standing there with expectant looks waiting for somebody to step in and take care of their every need. " i never feel sorry for idiots. period. but i do look at them as possible 'supplies' as they die off... 




and as far as the OP's ?..........never knew that the way of life my entire family has lived had a name....it was just that..our way of life......


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## SimpleJoys (Apr 28, 2012)

I started keeping stuff on hand in case there was a weather emergency years ago when I wasn't prepared for a coming ice storm. I was out of just about everything and it was just before payday, and I had to buy all the stuff I was holding off until payday to buy--praying the check wouldn't bounce. The lines in the grocery store were so long that the storm got there before I got out of the grocery store, so I had to drive ten miles home in heavy sleet and then unload the car in it. Never again! I started keeping a couple of weeks worth of food, an extra of everything, and some books and needlework projects kept back for days bad weather meant I couldn't get out of the house.

My husband started worrying about the economic collapse last year and talked about stocking up, but we didn't really start doing it on a large scale until this year. I don't really think we'll have a total TEOTWAWKI that would last forever, but I do think we could have anything from bad storms to a severe flu epidemic to civil unrest to hyperinflation that could make things really difficult for months or longer.

I also no longer trust the food stream to be safe. There have been too many deaths and illnesses from contaminated fruit, vegetables, and meat--and too many antibiotics, poisons, and who knows what else allowed in and on our food. If I grow it myself, I know it's safe. If I can it myself in glass jars, I know it's safe. Most of the stuff in grocery stores isn't even food--it's chemically enhanced food products. We now just eat real food, most of it raised here or by local farmers.


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## bigpaul (Jun 16, 2012)

9/11 really brought it home to me, i remember watching my TV is disbelief as the planes slammed into the towers, then again on 7/7 watching what happened in London( i live across the pond if you havent already guessed), thats when i started on the Prepper road, we moved from a medium sized town in Somerset, england back home to a small town in the North Devon countryside, surrounded by fields and farms and started prepping for what we all know will come one day in the not too distant future.


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## pixieduster (Mar 28, 2012)

tac803 said:


> Bottom line, I don't want to be dependant on somebody else taking care of my family if something happens. I don't see it as anybody else's job to make sure that we are taken care of, fed, and protected. I truly feel sorry for the people who live day to day blissfully unaware, not even contemplating what might happen. When something bad does happen, they are the angry ones, standing there with expectant looks waiting for somebody to step in and take care of their every need.


BINGO! The only reason we were in good shape was the prepping. I have to admit it was the first time I had "that feeling" before hand that something going to be very different and we better get ready.


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## SARSpecialist (May 31, 2012)

Disaters such as Hurricanes, Tornado, and such.. not sold on the whole global collapse issues but watching and listening to those who know about those issues.. and Zombies.. Not so much.


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