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I carry a commander-size all steel 1911 most days. IWB, about 4:30. Two spare 8 round mags owb at 7:30. A flashlight at 10:00 and a knife at 3:00. On a Wilderness instructor belt, all covered up by an untucked shirt. I'm not particularly heavy, but I'm certainly not rail thin, either. I'm perfectly comfortable. Once in awhile I need to just nudge the gun a bit in one direction or the other on the belt to stop it from digging somewhere. But generally it does just fine.

However, I had to cut a couple of new holes in the holster and move the belt loops down lower on it, to make the pistol ride a little higher than it otherwise would have. I also added a bit of additional cant to it. In its factory configuration, that holster caused me some pretty serious discomfort, no matter where on my beltline I put the pistol. So if you find a holster/gun/belt combination uncomfortable, just experiment with it until you find out how to make it work, and be creative in your thinking.

Some days, when printing might present a particular problem for various reasons, I carry a small 380 iwb with a couple spare mags and I can honestly say I have to occasionally remind myself it's there, because I could easily forget all about it. With the little gun, I don't even need a real gun belt. I'll carry this wearing a cheap little dress belt or whatever.

 

[gabepossenti]

I'd add to my personal safety much more by wearing a crash helmet when I drive than a gun on my hip, statistically speaking, so I'm just losing some motivation to strap on huge weights every morning. For the home, my game plan is a shotgun (and not to fire two blasts into the air). I'm all into personal protection and 100% support everyone's right to do it - I just quite frankly don't feel a "need" to drag around 30+ rounds and a "big" gun all day anymore (and small & light means holster and belt have more margin for 'error').

I agree with this.

I carry a heavy gun with extra mags almost by accident. The carry thing started because I finally decided to buy my first gun several years back, and had it all nicely put away in my closet, unloaded, with the ammo stored separately like they told me. And then I realized that was completely useless if I should ever actually need it. So I started trying to figure out how the heck to have a gun that was (a) child-safe and (b) available. The only way I ever came up with was actually carrying the gun on me. And once I started doing that around the house, it seemed silly to not keep it with me when I went out, so then came the concealed carry permit. And then spare mags...first one, which posed no problem, so then a second, which still posed no problem. So now I've got a pistol and two spare mags, more or less because, well, why not?

It's all cost-benefit analysis at this point. Sure, I almost certainly won't ever need a gun, and if I ever do, I'll probably just have to draw it, not actually shoot it, and if I do have to shoot it, it'll almost certainly be three shots or fewer......so this idea of carrying a large pistol with a lot of ammo (a lot, for a guy who carries a 1911, anyway), is a bit, from a statistical point of view. But, then, I'm not thinking statistics. I'm thinking, what can I reasonably carry JUST IN CASE, without causing myself any really serious inconvenience. And I try to find the right balance.