My home DGU

Setup: My wife and I live in a large >100 year old home we rent in a medium sized midwest city. Our master bedroom is on the second floor in the front of the house. Stepping out of the master bedroom puts you in front of stairs to the third floor, with railing to your right leading to two sets of stairs from the first to the second floor that meet in the middle (servant's stairs to the kitchen, and a set of stairs to the front).The incident: This morning at 4 AM my wife and I woke up to three very loud booms in short succession. I instantly recognized them as someone trying to get into the house. A huge dose of adrenaline got me on my feet and the shotgun I always have next to the bed in my hands before I could even complete a thought. I exited the master bedroom. Standing where the two sets of stairs meet, I look left and see the front door is shut and looks normal. I look right and I can see lights coming from the back of the house.The motion activated light in the very back hasn't worked in a few months, and we hadn't managed to get the landlord to fix it yet. Knowing there was not a source of light of the power I was seeing from that side of the house, I instantly got another huge dose of adrenaline. I yelled at my wife, "Grab a gun and call 911, I think someone is in the house!" She grabbed a handgun and moved to the back of the room out of sight of the door to call 911.Figuring they were in the back of the house, I repositioned so that I could still easily see the front door, but had an instant shot on anyone coming up the servant's stairs. At this point all I could do was wait.I heard my wife pleading on the phone with the 911 operator to hurry. At one point they ask where we are and she tells them she is in the master bedroom on the second floor and I am in the second floor hallway with a shotgun. I kept looking left, then right, never taking my finger away from the trigger and always keeping the shotgun pointed chest high at the first step of the servant's stairs. I probably repeated, "Don't come up the stairs. Don't come up the stairs. Don't come up the stairs." a million times in the three to four minutes it took the police to respond.The police used a dog to search the outside of the house then asked through the 911 operator for me to disarm to meet them at the front. At this point I still have no idea if someone actually made it inside and I am supposed to put my gun down and expose myself to let the police in. I had a flash of a thought in my head that they wouldn't ask me to disarm if they saw any entry open, so I handed my wife the shotgun and sprinted down the stairs to the front door.As soon as I opened it 7 police officers poured in and started clearing the house. The last one asked me where the shots were. This confused the hell out of me because I didn't shoot. Turns out my neighbors heard the booms at the door as well and called 911 to report gun shots at my house. The last officer in didn't seem to know about whether or not someone entered and seemed to think maybe the perp(s) did and I shot them.In the end, the perp(s) did not succeed in getting into the house. It appears they ran away when I yelled at my wife.Epilogue:The landlord fixed the light today and reinforced some of the door frames.We have a new camera system, but we didn't have it set up to record yet. That will change very soon.We didn't think to check the camera system because we were too busy with everything else, thus it wouldn't have been useful beyond video anyway (still, VERY useful).I didn't realize I left the safety on the shotgun until I repositioned. I am now practicing taking the safety off as I exit the bedroom.You do what you train. I periodically practice popping out of bed and grabbing the shotgun, and that's exactly what I did. That all seemed to go pretty smoothly aside from the safety part. via /r/CCW http://ift.tt/2cM7Auu