Appendix carry continues to enjoy a following. Younger and newer shooters love it. Instagram instructors love it. Keyboard commandos who bought a $90 Kydex taco and a YouTube degree love it. People who think skill comes shrink-wrapped next to the beef jerky at Bass Pro love it.
I still don’t.
Not because I’m a fossil who refuses new tricks. Not because I can’t conceal a compact at 1 o’clock. But because the muzzle is pointed at the parts of you that keep you walking, talking, and having fun.
If you screw up the holstering process — and people do, including people who teach this stuff for a living — the best-case scenario is a ruined sex life, a whole lot of discomfort and a very expensive conversation with a trauma surgeon. The more likely one is a hole in your femoral artery and a very short remaining lifespan to reflect on your decision to appendix carry.
I’ll say it again for the people already typing “But I train!” in comments: If you mess up while holstering appendix, you are in serious trouble. You will not get a cool scar on your ass for chicks to dig. Instead you will get a high-velocity reminder that Rule 2 exists for a reason.
Yes, appendix carry conceals well. Yes, the draw can be stupid fast. It’s accessible while driving or sitting almost anywhere. With the right body and the right rig, it can even be comfortable. None of that changes the geometry, the physics or the anatomy.
The gun is still looking right at your femoral and your family jewels. Other carry positions point at less important real estate. It’s true that scars are like tats with better stories. A mistake at 4 o’clock and you may get yourself a scar. Maybe a limp. A mistake at 12 o’clock you may give yourself a funeral and your family and friends a really sad day.
At least the funeral can be open casket.
Practice until you can’t get it wrong, the advocates say. Fine. Now do it after you’ve just shot someone who was trying to knife you in an alley. Your hands are shaking. The adrenaline dump turns your fine motor skills into a drunk piano recital. Sirens are coming. Bystanders are screaming, or worse yet fighting with you because you shot their ne’er-do-well relative or friend.
You still going to execute that perfect, eyes-on, slow-is-smooth re-holster process? Or are you going to survive the attack, only to lose the gunfight with yourself?
I’ve seen the “I’m careful” crowd. I also watched a highly trained instructor — someone who teaches this for a living — have one of her fellow highly trained instructors put a hollow point into her own hip crease after a long training day because she was distracted and talking while she holstered.
The round traveled down, rupturing the femoral in three places. She only lived because a room full of people who actually know trauma medicine put not one, but two CAT tourniquets on her in under thirty seconds and they met an ambulance a few short minutes later. She still needed emergency surgery and a whole lot of blood.
Here’s a thing…you aren’t gonna have those combat medics and pros if you pop yourself by accident or through negligence. Most of us will be in a parking lot, a range with spotty cell service, or a dark street with no one who’s carrying a tourniquet next to their energy drink.
Here’s another one.
‘Half-Sack’
During a professional firearms training session, YouTuber and first responder “North Wind Aerial” suffered a serious negligent discharge while drawing a GLOCK from an appendix holster. From the trainer’s start signal to the shot, less than half a second passed. The round fired while the pistol was still in or just leaving the holster. It punched through the holster, the seam of his jeans, his penis, scrotum, and left testicle.
Ouch.
He lost roughly a liter of blood and was rushed into surgery, where the damaged left testicle was removed. Urinary tract injury required a catheter for weeks. Fire-department colleagues nicknamed him “Half-Sack.” Despite 15-plus years of professional firearms experience, the incident happened during a timed draw under training pressure.
He posted a frank video about a week later, mixing medical detail with dry humor.
He later fired a pistol again without further injury and said he hoped the story would make others more careful with appendix carry and trigger discipline. The video became his most-viewed upload. He has stated he will keep making drone and first-responder content rather than chase the incident’s attention, while sharing recovery updates.
The usual workarounds don’t survive contact with reality. “I take the holster out of my pants every time.” Sure you do — until you don’t. “I’ll just set the gun down after a shooting.” Great plan until you need it again in the next thirty seconds. “It’s safer than other methods.” Keep telling yourself that while the muzzle stays pointed at the one artery that can empty you in under two minutes.
I have seriously considered appendix carry. The speed and the concealment are very real. I still won’t do it. My life, and the lives of the people who would have to mop me up are worth more than a slightly faster draw from concealment. A scar across the glute is an inconvenience. A self-inflicted femoral hit is probably lights out.
Carry however you want. It’s your choice. Just don’t pretend the risk is imaginary because your last 500 dry reps went fine. Murphy doesn’t care about your Instagram holster pics. He only cares that the muzzle was pointed at the one part of you that doesn’t bounce back.