About a third of U.S homes with young children have a firearm in the house which means that some 2 million kids are at risk of a gun-related injury. Children are naturally curious and very skilled at finding hidden objects so even a concealed but unlocked weapon can be found and kids as young as three are strong enough to pull a trigger. Adolescents are at an even greater risk of injury and suicide.
What is even more devastating is the fact that all these tragedies can easily be prevented by taking a few simple precautionary steps.
Safety at home
The best and surest way to prevent a gun-related accident or injury in a home is to remove the firearms. In that way, children have no access to them, whether they knew where they were stored or they just happened to stumble upon them.
However, if you insist on exercising your Second Amendment Rights and having a gun in your home for safety and protection of your family, it’s imperative you keep it unloaded, locked and stored away. It’s also recommended you keep the ammunition in a separate cabinet and have the keys to both cabinets in a place inaccessible to kids.
Some states even demand you keep your licensed firearms safe for everyone’s safety so it’s wise to consider installing a high-quality gun safe in your home. It’s best if you keep them concealed so make it a part of your home improvement project to find the best place for it that is not obvious and conspicuous. By reading expert gun safe reviews, you can get a lot of useful information on the best safes, prices, performances, locking and opening mechanisms, ways of installing them in your home and what anti-theft protection is the best.
Hide the safe
As mentioned before, it’s best you keep the gun safe hidden. The location of your safe is very important so if you keep it on display, you increase the chances of someone, your kids included, trying to break it open.
It’s experts’ advice to keep the gun safe either hidden under the bed, on top of a cupboard, inside your wardrobe or even mounted or built in a wall behind a wall covering so they’re not easily seen. As the old saying goes, out of sight, out of mind – if your kids can’t see it, they’re more likely to forget it even exist.
At other people’s homes
What happens at other people’s homes is not something you can control, but when your kids go to their friends’ houses to play or hang out, they’re also at risk if there are firearms present. What you can do is to talk to the friends’ parents and learn if they own guns and how they store them. It’s a simple conversation just like when you talk about your kids’ medical conditions, allergies, pets or what the healthiest snacks are. If there indeed are guns in the homes where your kids spend their time playing, urge those parents to take all the necessary safety measures and precautions.
Firearms and teenagers
As kids grow older, many parents tend to loosen the house rules expecting their kids to be more mature and responsible when it comes to respecting boundaries, Very often, they expect it’s no longer necessary to keep their firearms so strictly locked away. Unfortunately, statistics show that it’s the teenagers who are most likely to suffer from gun-related injuries. Being in a sensitive period in their lives, both physically and emotionally, teens are at a high risk of attempting suicide by a gun which in 90% of cases results in death. If you know that your teen is under a lot of pressure, struggling with school or mental or emotional issues, it’s best you keep the guns out of your home and prevent tragedy from happening.
Educate your kids
Knowledge is power so educating your kids about the dangers of firearms is crucial for their and everyone else’s safety. Children are more guided by their emotions rather than reason so when they do come in contact with a firearm, their curiosity and excitement often overshadow whatever rational thinking there may be. It’s crucial you give them all the knowledge and instruction you can about the outcomes of playing with guns and if you feel what you’re giving isn’t enough, there are often local community classes and educational programs that can offer more help.
Ensuring the safety of your family is a priority but not at the expense of your kids’ lives. You have a choice of either removing your firearms from the house or keeping them safely stored away, unloaded and locked.
