Well, after some time (with delays for various reasons), my wife was finally able to make arrangements to go get her initial handgun training the other week from a qualified, reputable and highly recommended NRA instructor.
Following her "classroom" session, it was time for "practical" shooting exercises. She was give a small selection of guns to choose from, and chose a 9mm Glock, after deciding that she didn't like the way the offered Smith & Wesson felt, nor the general feel of another (whose brand name was forgotten...)
Since I was not in attendance to see things as they unfolded, I had only the shot up target to see how she had done. All 50 rounds on the paper, as can be seen below...
Looked to me like she had not too much trouble with the 9mm, and she liked the way it felt in her hands, as well as firing it.
In the past few months leading up to her instruction, we'd had plenty of discussions and back and forth over the merits of various different firearms, with me constantly giving her the affirmation that whatever she eventually decided upon would be fine with me.
Well, tonight we "made a date" at the local indoor range to test drive a few different models and calibers.
One of the guns we took into the range was a 9mm CZ, which neither of us cared for, as it just seemed foreign (no pun intended) to the mechanisms that we'd been manipulating on my current Sig 229. It seemed clunky, and somewhat complicated. Which in actuallity was incorrect, just "different".
Then we brought in a Sig 239 in .40, which had Hogue finger groove grips already installed, and SWAMBO really liked the way it felt in her hands.
The Hogue grip fit the contours of her hands, trigger was readily accessible with proper hand positioning, and everything just "worked"...
However, the .40 (165 gr) was a bit more than she cared for, and I could see how her shoulders "jammed" back a little with each shot.
She was a trooper though, and put two magazines through the weapon before she asked if she could turn that one in to try the same frame in a 9mm.
No problem...
Although this one in 9mm didn't have the Hogue grips (to mimic the finger grooves that she initially liked in the Glock, and then again on the .40 P239), the sizing was to her liking, and the recoil was felt to be very managable.
Her groupings remained consistent, and she kept putting shots downrange until the aftermarket magazine flew apart during a reloading. They didn't have any replacement magazines (at least that they would bring out) so that ended that part of the experiments...
She didn't stop there though, as now she was very keen to have a go at the paper man with my 229. I relinquished control immediately, forgetting that I had 180gr ammunition in the magazine. By watching her shoulders, the "snap" or whatever we want to call it was readily evident in each of the 7 shots she took. But she didn't stop until the slide locked back on an empty magazine.
She commented later that she felt comfortable enough with the controls to decide that the Sig P239 in a 9mm would be a gun she would like to have for her own.
I'm more than fine with that, and am very glad to have received such wonderful advice here on The Firing Line that I started to learn how to keep my damn mouth shut and let the lady decide for herself...
Well, with *maybe* a little guidance from He Who Knows Whats Best For His Wife... (i'm goin' to hell for that, ain't I??)
Thanks for all your help gang!!!