ATM situation

Hey y’all,This happened a week back but I’ve just been kinda processing it all since. It was just a normal night on vacation in beautiful Washington, I was hunting down a no fee atm to grab some cash and head to dinner. After searching for a while I finally found a place, mind you it was pretty dark at this point so I was looking for a drive thru option. I pull up to a fairly busy street bustling bars and restaurants and what not but can’t see a drive thru anywhere.Quick park the rental and hop out to take a look, I walk up to the banks door and they’ve got a sign that says “ATM in back”. Cool, no big deal this a nice area it seems like, then I look, maybe a 10-15 yard narrow alley with absolutely no lighting. Nice pretty bricks and murals and vegetation, great bars and stuff nearby so I take a deep breathe and carry on. I start to walk down the alley when I see a guy. He’s standing maybe 10 feet from the ATM at the end of the alley smoking a cig. I know this seems sus but I see a car parked and maybe he’s just smoking a cig after a night of drinking; there’s no way I’m actually gonna get robbed right? Right?Well I get to the ATM and get my cash, throughout the entire transaction I’m very obviously glaring at this guy. Kind of hoping I can get a read on him, kind hoping I can hint to him I wanna be left alone. ATM spits out my cash and I start to walk back, I’m locking eyes with this guy as I walk back towards him and the alley. As soon as I get maybe a foot from him he drops his cig and puts it out to turn behind me, instantly I mentally freeze up. I was in like shock, I’ve watched so many ASP videos and read so much on here. But in my head in that moment my only thought was “this isn’t fucking happening”. I turn around full 180* to confirm this is actually happening, he fucking closes the distance a little more. I was in utter shock, he hadn’t said a word to me yet, hadn’t shown a weapon but everything felt like a robbery. In my head I didn’t feel comfortable using force especially in Washington till more was done. But holy fuck was I scared and just shocked.I straight up grab my gun, I didn’t unholster it but I got a good grip on her. I’ve never been in that kind of fear and shock, part of me was trying to tell myself this isn’t happening while simultaneously trying to figure out the amount of force I should be using. I am a big guy but this guy was 3x my size in a narrow ass alley. I figured the gun was my best force multiplier but I wouldn’t draw till the last second. I had my POM on me. I decided fuck it I’m just gonna run, sprinted the last 10 feet to the car and peeled out.In the week since this has happened it’s been a situation I’ve been constantly mulling over in my head. I had a lot of options there, options I preach to the masses, vocal commands, OC spray etc. But when the shit was hitting the fan I just fucking froze up, I felt stupid, vulnerable and unprepared after this. In retrospect I should have issued vocal commands followed by climbing the use of force ladder. I hope this paints a picture to a lot of this sub, no matter how hard you train, how hard you preach this shit, it’s still very easy to utterly freeze up when it gets very real very quick. I knew what I had to do, but applying that to a situation in real time, especially when your feeling that shock and the unreal feel to it all is so fucking hard. via /r/CCW https://ift.tt/3pKhHFP