Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns 65 year old lady with bad arthritis wants to shoot.

If it has to be a handgun, I'd agree with CaribouJack on the Ruger LCRx because of the smooth rollover in the trigger and the ability to shoot either SA or DA. But I also think 41MagFan has the right idea in looking at the Ruger carbine. Honestly I'd worry about her hurting herself with a handgun she can't easily manipulate or hold when shooting.

Not a handgun expert by any stretch of the imagination, but unless the 65 year old lady is going to go out and practice alone, I don't see where her problems with racking the slide or loading the magazine really matter. Leave her with a fully loaded weapon that she can point and shoot. If she runs out of rounds without putting down the home invader, she's not going to get a chance to reload and rack the slide anyway. (Might want to consider a larger gun with higher capacity). When she practices, her son will presumably be on hand to help with the mag and the slide. What am I missing?

Even just handling a loaded up semi auto (as in carrying it from room to room or taking it out of the drawer and putting it back) is more prone to AD in the hands of a novice than a double action, medium frame, revolver in ready condition.

I think a person should be able to fully load and operate the pistol that they will use for home security, and shouldn't have to rely on someone who may not be there if their pistol needs to be loaded or unloaded, or if their pistol jams.
The solution is either a revolver or a large well trained dog.

If that's part of her problem, then sure, a DA revolver is worth a try, although arthritic hands might have trouble with a DA trigger. I didn't see that as part of the OP's description of the issues she was struggling with. Whatever he leaves her with, need to be sure she can handle it safely.

Any trouble pulling a trigger will surely be overcome by adrenaline if there is a dire situation. It's a very intuitive action even for a novice.

Clearing a jam or loading a clip could be more troublesome. Or for some, even putting the magazine in the right diection.
A revolver is very nearly foolproof.

My grandma had a big revolver and always said she'd aim for the feet cause the recoil would put it where it needed to be. That might've been an exaggeration on her part.

I know an elderly lady that is very much like the one the OP described. Her hand strength was minimal. We tried a variety of DA revolvers, but the trigger pulls and recoil were just too much for her. I had her shoot a Ruger MKII .22LR pistol. She was able to operate it just fine. While a .22LR isn't noted as a self defense cartridge, it sure beats anything else we tried for her. YMMV.

Yeah, a .22 is worlds better than a sharp stick. Should be enough to get 99% of perps to realize they have more urgent business elsewhere.

Don't know if she had arthritis so may be a moot point, but my Granny lived to be 89, I got her a Walther 380 and loaded her up some FMJ flat point bullets, she kept and fired that weapon for I know the last 20+ years of her life.

I was thinking a PMR30 at first. I've never shot one but the slide looks easy to grasp and would think easy to slide with it's relatively light recoil spring.
Plus, very low recoil.

Not trying to be argumentative here, but the responses I'm getting, while somewhat valid, are not all that convincing. If she can't keep her finger off the trigger until she is on target, maybe she shouldn't have any gun. But that doesn't seem to be the problem, inasmuch as the son provided her with a semi-auto to begin with. Still seems to me something on the order of a G17 would minimize the problems that were stated.

Poor reliability, from what I've seen on YouTube.

My grandmother like to joke around a bit. Like when you start off a sentence, "Well", she'd throw in a response "mighty deep subject", before you got the chance to assume that a jam, or misfire, would happen after the fifth shot and not right off the bat.

Fact is, those were different times and she had what she had. And what she had she was going to use if she had to.

I never saw her, but I'm sure she had shot the gun at least a couple of times. And like I said, I'm sure her jestful statement about shooting at the feet was just that. And while recoil is somewhat diminished by the action of a auto, it is not eliminated. And that same action of the slide is the reason that a revolver can actually be gotten back on target and subsequent shots fired faster than with an autoloader.

Myself, I'd shoot either. Makes no difference the action type to me. You just get what you get when you have a certain cartridge that you want to fire.
I do like the versatility of a .357 Magnum revolver and the ability to shoot .38 Special out of it.

And for many people, the simplicity of loading and shooting a revolver can't be matched.
Misfire? Keep pulling the trigger.
How do you load this thing? Drop'm in those holes.

I have two PMR30's. They have been flawless. They are loud but easy to shoot. They should be excellent for a new shooter.

So, in reality, just what are the chances that this little old lady is going to use this or any other gun?
If she lives in a real bad neighborhood it may make more sense to change locations. Thinking this lady is going to join the league of gunslingers that inhabit this site is rather irrational at best.

Still not convinced. If jams and misfires were that likely, no one would own anything but revolvers. We will have to agree to disagree. And lest you think that I am biased in favor of autos, I'm don't own one myself, not yet. But for the problems as described by the OP, that's where logic takes me.

He said she had difficulty loading the shield and racking the slide. You assume she'll always have someone with her to do everything for her. Like giving a blind person a magazine subscription and assume someone will always be there to read it.

But there's a lot of value in Independence. Maybe not for you, but for most. I say get her something she can load and shoot on her own.

Now I don't know about a lady Smith because that's a lightweight gun with a bit of snap.
I'd lean towards a Model 10. With a 4" barrel.

Things I am assuming;
She can exercise trigger finger control, as evidenced by her son giving her a Shield to begin with.
A larger semi auto will be easier for her to shoot accurately while under duress.
By the time she runs out of bullets with a 17 shot semi, she would have had to "drop the bullets in the hole" two times after the initial 5 shots missed.
She will not have a jam or a misfire in the first five shots from said semi auto.
The issue with a home invader will be resolved one way or another before she has to work the slide, or switch mags.
When she goes to the range she will not be alone, and her companion (her son) will help her with the slide.

Things I am not assuming:
That the adrenaline rush will enable her arthritic finger to operate a double action trigger with the precision necessary to neutralize the threat inside of 5 shots.
That same adrenaline rush will subside so that she can drop more bullets in the holes while the invader is still upright.

Your magazine subscription analogy is just plain silly. To be analogous, the woman would have to be unable to operate either firearm.

There is value in independence without a doubt. Ideally she could do it all for herself. But she can't, so give her the easiest handgun possible to shoot accurately, and one which does the most to offset her deficiencies in hand strength. Protection first, independence second.

We do agree on one thing: if she does go with a revolver, get one with as much heft as she can handle, such as the model 10 you suggest.

Dude, she's not Mrs Smith the CIA agent. She's never going to be able to get 17 shots off against anybody.

And what if she wants to go to the range and shoot one day by herself. You can't carry a loaded gun onto the firing line.

I never said she would need 17 shots, "dude". If you'll recall, one of the original complaints was that she had trouble hanging on the Shield. My suggestion was that a larger auto, such as a G17, would be easier for her to hang onto, as well as continuing to provide a lighter trigger for her arthritic fingers. The 17 shots is a happy bonus that also reduces the number of times she might have to try to work the slide. Try to keep up. And we already addressed the issue of going to the range alone, under the heading of independence. Remember?

In my second post of this thread, I acknowledged the validity of the points in favor of a DA revolver, but said that given the facts as stated I was not convinced that a heavy DA trigger was necessarily the best option for someone with arthritic fingers. It might be, it might not be.

If I decide I want to discuss this further, I'll find another brick wall, offline, to converse with.