I went with my daughter in law and son to shoot yesterday. He's shot a bit, mostly shotgun, but she's never handled a gun before.

I'm not an instructor, but somehow I have ended up teaching a number of first time shooters. I walked her through the four rules, loading, unloading, sight picture, slight alignment, double action vs single action, etc. I spent a lot of time on grip and stance and she caught on pretty quickly.

She was using my Model 18, which I think is a good first time shooter gun since it has almost no recoil. My son has a Taurus 92 .22 LR revolver which he shot, but the action is very stiff for her.

She did pretty well with the revolver, so we moved on to a Colt 22 semi auto that my son's friend lent him. She liked that, but thought that the Model 18 was easier to shoot.

She tried one shot from my 3913, but didn't like the recoil. I told her that was OK since it was her first time shooting and that she might like to retry that at a future point when she's done some more shooting and is used to handling guns. She's also about four months pregnant, so I was very, very careful.

My son also tried the Model 18 and I think I have a S&W convert on my hands. He couldn't believe how smooth it was to shoot, especially compared to his Taurus. Which I tried and found to have a really heavy DA trigger pull.

As we were finishing up a gentleman approached us and mentioned that another shooter who had just left was looking for an instructor and wondered if I'd be interested in teaching? Which was kind of flattering considering that I'm not an instructor. It does, however, make me think that if I'm going to be working with new shooters, even informally, it's worth my time and money to get some training so that I actually know what I'm doing.

I think that my DIL has the bug a bit. She wants to try again sometime in the future.

She even mentioned taking a formal course and getting her CCW permit.

I'll probably start another thread about that. If she doesn't like 9mm, 38 spcl is probably out. Which leaves me wondering what other options there are out there for women to use for self defense.

Perfect post for me. I'm taking my sister shooting this Saturday. She's never handled a gun either. Model 18 is my choice too.

Something to consider.

Shooting is dirty. I go shooting, and afterwards I quite often have black stuff inside my nose. Much more prevalent at an indoor range. Powder smoke? Bullet lube smoke? Lead dust? Don't know. But it's there. If it's in my nose, logic says SOME of it had to make it past the protective hairs and into my lungs, and therefore into the bloodstream.

Probably not good for unborn baby.

There is also a theory that the noise of gunshots is hard on the unborn. Maybe their ears are more delicate. Maybe it's the fluid they are floating in, that makes it seem louder. Again - I don't know. But I have heard.

I, personally, would request someone pregnant, that I cared about, to not go shooting until after the baby was born.

Just in case.

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I always take precautions

I remember one of Jeff Cooper's thoughts on recoil.

If you absolutely cannot handle the recoil of a larger caliber, get a 22 and practice until you can consistently hit a ping-pong ball. Then aim for the face.

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I always take precautions

Outdoor shooting, using quality ammo. Plated 22 at that.

But .380 seems to be popular for women these days.