Ask Dr. Helen: Preparing for Disaster — Prudent or Paranoid?

So when does preparing for the worst shade over from prudence into paranoia? That’s a question that often comes up when people talk about preparing for disasters, financial meltdowns, or confrontation with criminals. How much is enough, and how much is too much?

It’s been over a year that I have been writing this column and I happened to take a look recently at the first piece I wrote, entitled “What Kinds of Things Should an Adult Be Able to Do?” The article and your responses got me thinking about being prepared for disasters or incidents in general that require skill and forethought to overcome. Using Heinlein’s quote on generalization, I opined that it was important for adults to be able to do a number of things such as drive a stick shift or swim a reasonable distance. Heinlein’s quote is as follows:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

What about applying Heinlein’s thoughts to disaster preparedness? In my estimation, it is prudent — within reason — to be able to handle a wide range of situations that call for general skills, just as Heinlein suggests. It is important to be prepared for any number of natural or man-made disasters even though the chances of being the victim of any specific one may be small. I will include self-defense here because being a victim of a crime is not necessarily a rare occurence but one that happens all too often; in 2006, for example, an estimated 1,417,000 violent crimes were committed across the country.

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