We reported earlier this year that more black women in the U.S. are buying guns and training to use them for self defense.

Today, thenewstribune.com posted a photo essay showing some of the real women gun owners behind the rising statistics in Georgia.

The women who appear in the portraits with their firearms come from all walks of life with a menagerie of professions and backgrounds.

"What's going to happen if something goes bump in the night?" said Laura Manning, a 50-year-old payroll specialist, in the story. "I need to protect myself."

The photos include a shot of Stayce Robinson, 49, from Douglasville, Georgia posing with her AR. Robinson says she grew up around firearms because her grandparents, who were small business owners, had them for protection.

"I've never been scared of guns. I respect their power," she said, adding that she got her first gun at age 18—a .380-caliber pistol. The AR was a Christmas gift from her husband last year, the story says.

"It's the best gift ever," she said in the story. "If I'm placed in the position to have to use a gun, I won't hesitate."

Another subject of the photo series, Daphne Jordan, posed with her Walther PK380. She is a 44-year-old clinical field specialist at a biotech firm who also grew up around guns.

"It was somewhat viewed as taboo, as bad," she said in the story. In high school, she joined the ROTC rifle team and was one of its best shooters, the story says. But she didn't pick up the hobby again until several years after she graduated.

In 2015, her home was burglarized.

"I just felt violated," she said in the story. It prompted her to learn to shoot again and use a firerarm for self-defense, but she only felt at home within the structure of a team—so she became a certified firearms instructor and began teaching other women how to shoot.

Some women in the photo series didn’t grow up around firearms, but still came to the conclusion that they need to be armed to have a chance at defending themselves if the need should arise.

Alicia Kelley, a 36-year-old banker from Buford, Georgia says she “fell in love with shooting at the range,” and that she and her husband decided to buy a gun for protection when they bought a home.

“As times have changed, it’s good to have home protection,” she said in the story. “It's so unpredictable. People used to hide behind the computer but now they're coming out. You don't know who you're going to run into. Nowadays people are acting before they're thinking."

For more photos and stories from armed black women in America, check out the full story from thenewstribune.com here.