Sounds like you need a smaller pea shooter then. I can hang my P3AT in the waist of a pair of board shorts and nobody knows it's there.
I know a .380 is puny, and I'd rather have something more substantial like my Glock 30, but 7 rounds of .380 is still better than no gun at all. And I don't want to be shot with a .177 pellet gun, let alone a .380 hollowpoint.
As far as the topic goes, if I lived in an open carry state, or was carrying on horseback or something, I'd be comfortable with something like a SBH in .44mag on my hip.