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Richard S
Richard S's picture
Blackout During Self Defence

Good day,

I have two questions. The first is it normal to forget certain aspects of a self-defence encounter. In two encounters when I had to use physical force to defend myself and in the second encounter defending someone else there was a period during the encounter which I cannot recall. For the one encounter I can't recall the start until I had the other person pinned on the ground. This was many years ago and I could never remember anything from walking next to the person until I had them pinned to the ground a few meters away.

The second was an incident which happened last night. I was at a meeting. A man came in late whom I did not know but had a "funny" feeling about. Towards the end of the meeting he got up and stormed to the back of the building. I got up because I knew he was going to cause trouble. I remember seeing him go to a walled off section where he grabbed a cricket bat. From there he must of proceded again to the front of the building. I don't remember anything from the moment he had his back to me in the gap between the two walls until I was standing at the front of the building holding onto him from behind with my arms under his shoulders pointing up. He was swinging the cricket bat becuase there was someone present in the meeting whom he wanted to assault. I was able to restrain him and prevent the attack.

It concerns me that there are times during both of these encounters that I can't remember. I'm not sure what my thought processes were to get to the position I was in. It concerns me becuase if I can't remember what I was doing I can't think what to do in the future to do better and I'm also not sure if I am thinking and reponding correctly during the situation.

The second question is regarding my position with the guy in the most recent attack. I was able to get behind him and grab him in a grip which I think is similar to a standing Full Nelson except I didn't apply any pressure to his neck and kept my forearms/hands up around his face. Should I have applied pressure to his neck similar to a Full Nelson. Were there advantages or dissadvantages to not doing that and keeping my forearms and hands pointing upwards.I felt I had control of him. I was watching the bat but didn't feel that he could effectively. We were moving the whole time but I was ready to use my holds on his shoulders to manipulate his movement and check his balance. I was also able to keep him far enough away from anyone else so that he couldn't harm them with the bat.

Thank you for any insights or input.

Roman Ostien
Roman Ostien's picture

Hello Richard,

to answer the first question: Yes, it is quite common.

Although you can't really call if "forget". It is rather that some consious parts of your brain are overriden by the faster/"instictual" parts of the brain to such a degree that no memories form in the first place. (At least to my limited understanding)

To quote Dave Grossman's book "On Combat" (Chapter Two, page 74, first paragraph) : "Dr. Artwohl's research found that 74 percent of the officers involved in a deadly force encounter acted on automatic pilot. In other words, the actions of three out of four officers in combat were done without conscious thought".

This chapter shines a light on exaclty what you were descibing. I recommend this book in general, since it looks at all the different ways that adrenaline affects the body and brain.

Another interesting book that I recommend in that regard is "Thinking fast and slow" by Daniel Kahneman, but unlike "On Combat" it is not directly combat related.

My only personal experience with this phenomenon was when I rode my motorcycle, slipped on some debris on the road and fell to the side. One moment I break my fall with my forearms, the next moment I am standing next to my bike. I have no collection of freeing my trapped leg from under the bike and getting up.

Roman Ostien
Roman Ostien's picture

As for the second question: Since you managed to keep yourself and the people around you safe from harm and had control of the attacker, I would say this was as ideal as you can get in such a situation. Because it was truly "minimal force" which is easily defendable if you have to explain yourself in court. Going for the neck from the get-go would have indeed been safer from a purely physical perspective, but it could have resulted in whiplash or other neck injuries which could make you liable for damages. Or the guy would be able to lie about the condition of his neck. Someone who tries to attack other people with a cricket bat propably won't loose sleep over lying in court.

Also, if I understand your desciption correctly, you would have been able to apply pressure at any point if the situation had required it. And since you managed to control him like this alone, I would say well done.

Richard S
Richard S's picture

Hello Roman, Thank you for your reply. That is very helpful and gives me a bit more peace of mind. I will look into those books. Thank you.

Richard S
Richard S's picture

Thank you Roman. That is true. I appreciate both of your replies.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Hi Richard,

Richard S wrote:
… is it normal to forget certain aspects of a self-defence encounter.

I would say yes. There are conflicting studies on how stress effects memory, but an inability to accurately recall certain aspects of a violent interaction is widely reported. This Wikipedia article may be of interest:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_stress_on_memory

“Cortisol is a known biomarker for stress.[8] Under normal circumstances, the hippocampus regulates the production of cortisol through negative feedback because it has many receptors that are sensitive to these stress hormones. However, an excess of cortisol can impair the ability of the hippocampus to both encode and recall memories.[2] These stress hormones are also hindering the hippocampus from receiving enough energy by diverting glucose levels to surrounding muscles.[2]”

One thing to consider is that our memories aren’t great anyway. We don’t really try to recall the mundane things, but we do try to recall the details of more unusual events. If I was to ask what you ate for dinner three weeks ago today, you probably would not know … but you would not see that as cause for concern.

We can remember things incorrectly too. There’s a BBC podcast (“Bad People”) on crime where one of the presenters is a criminal psychologist. On one episode she told the story of study she had been involved in where the participants were unaware it was study into false memory / false confessions. The researchers had talked to family members and chatted with the participants about childhood events. They then added in a false story, “Your parents told us about the time the police came to your home because you’d threatened a friend with a knife … can you tell us about that?” They would then add in a detail that seemed true i.e. “I think the friend was called, “David”… you want to school with him, right?” An alarming high number would then elaborate on details believing what they were saying to be true. They would then have to reassure them they had done no such thing. Our brains like to fill in the gaps to make coherent stories. This obviously has implications for the criminal justice system.

The memory loss / false memories associated with self-defence is obviously an issue too because it can be incorrectly assumed a person is deliberately lying. A standard bit of advice is to write down what happened soon after the event (or get your legal advisor to do it) because memories can legitimately shift over time, which can again lead to accusations of lying or “changing your story”.

My father was a magistrate, and he was given training on these issues in order to avoid reaching unsound conclusions around a failure of memory.

Roman Ostien wrote:
To quote Dave Grossman's book "On Combat" ...

That’s an interesting book which touches on lots of these topics.

All the best,

Iain

Richard S
Richard S's picture

Hi Iain

A very big thank you for your reply and the helpful information. It's good to know that this is not something unique to me. Also the advice about writing an account immediately afterwards is something I will keep in mind if there is ever an incident which requires it in the future. I'll read through the Wikipedia article thank you.

Fortunately I have had an opportunity to watch video footage of the incident which has helped fill in the blank period.

All the best

Richard

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Hi Richard,

Richard S wrote:
A very big thank you for your reply and the helpful information.

You are most welcome.

Richard S wrote:
It's good to know that this is not something unique to me.

Definitely not. The study of how the body and mind react to stress is something that should be included in self-protection training. The idea that certain elements must be unique to us is understandable – because we only live our lives from the “inside” – but also isolating and incorrect.

Richard S wrote:
Fortunately, I have had an opportunity to watch video footage of the incident which has helped fill in the blank period.

That’s another important point. Video is everywhere these days and that can be helpful for those morally and legally in the right because it will back up their version of events … however, people can legitimately misremember and, without adequate training / knowledge, that could falsely lead those in the criminal justice system to conclude there was a deliberate attempt to mislead when comparing video with personal accounts.

All the best,

Iain

Richard S
Richard S's picture

Hi Iain,

Thank you. Very much appreciated. Also thank you for all of your helpful and valuable material.

All the best.

Richard