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View Full Version : Unique and weird situation. Help?



achilles097
12-30-10, 02:08 PM
I've been talking to a recruiter in the past month because I really want to become a Marine. This may be confusing and I have done my best to condense it. I have looked at the other MOS's, but I'd like to be Infantry.


A little backstory: My dad is a foreign service officer with USAID (a segment of DOS) and we have moved around country-to-country before I turned 7. I always remembered the Marine Guard at the embassies and looking up to them. I have since lived in the U.S. since I was 7, living on occasion with my dad if he's back from assignment in Arlington, Va. I grew up with a huge influence living nearby the Iwo Jima monument and Quantico, VA (that new museum that opened a few years ago is great) and I always fondly liked learning about the history of the Marine Corps. My uncle enlisted before Vietnam and was a grunt during the war. Several of my best friends are in the Marines. I have had strong desires to serve since 2006.

Now to the situation:

I have a few medical conditions but my recruiter said none of them were DQ'able. I have flat feet, but it doesn't give me any pain when I run. I had ADHD ,but I have been off for a year with my doctor's recommendation. Since then I received some of my best grades in high school without meds. He's told me nothing about waivers for the flat feet. Is this usual? If so, it appears I am fully qualified unless MEPS decides something else not to my knowledge.


My main concern: I go to college in the middle of virginia, three hours away from my house. College isn't working out mostly because I went to college to please my dad. I wasn't able to enlist in 2009 during my senior year because I had to be off meds for a full year which was in December 2010. I am trying to enlist at the recruiters in town and ship out in May. I went in mid-December, just before finals, and they told me they only had a certain number of AD "spots" and they are mostly for high school seniors. The recruiters really wanted me to enlist quickly before their VERY last AD spot was gone. I couldn't enlist at the time because I was at college and my father at the time was serving in Nicaragua and we had no access to my documents. From what they told me, they are not obligated to reserve a spot, so if anyone else came in and asked for a AD spot with all his paperwork, they'll give it to him. I don't know yet if anyone else has tried to enlist because I am in Colombia on vacation without a phone.

As I said, the earliest ship date they quoted me was May so I agreed on attending another semester of college, but recently I found out that I was put on academic suspension. I won't go into many of the details, but several of my friends died during the school year and this is the first year of my dad having prostate cancer and this was the first thanksgiving I had to spend without my family. My uncle I mentioned is in poor shape and his lung collapsed, but now is out of the hospital but we don't know if he'll last another year. I know it's his dream (and mine) to see me as a Marine, and I would love to help him see that before he passes away. I wasn't academically focused because I didn't want to be in college, my family was sick and some of my good friends passed away. I stayed out of trouble and never drank. I expect them to accept the appeal, but if they don't I'll be forced to live by myself in northern Virginia without a car until my dad gets back from Nicargua in March (my dad said I could go with him to Nicaragua but that would mean I cannot enlist because I would be overseas and not attending poolee functions from what i was told). I don't know whether the recruiters in Arlington,VA would be allowed to drive me to poolee functions, but I will drive the bus, ride a bike or run in the ****ing worst weather imaginable to be at each one. My dad isn't excited that I'll be living by myself and he's worried about me having no support if something went wrong, but I think I'd be fine.

If my appeal is accepted and I do go back to school with that last spot, then I have that open contract and I don't know if that's bad or not. So, generally what I want to know is if I should live by myself or stay at school? I would have enough money to sustain myself and definitely a job. Staying in school past the next semester if they accept the appeal isn't really an option because my dad and I both agreed if my heart is not with college at the moment there's no use keeping me there, because right now my motivation has always been with serving.

Sgt Leprechaun
12-30-10, 11:22 PM
I'll be honest here....are you SURE you are up to going to Recruit Training with all these family medical and other issues ongong in your life right now? What are you going to do if someone dies while you are there? Or in MOS School? And you can't go home for the funeral/grieving?


Next item: You can't drive? How old are you? No car or no license?? If no license, why?

Flat feet unless they severely impair your ability to walk and march are not grounds for DQ for the most part.

You really need to go to MEPS and find out before you go making big life changing plans though. Only then will you know for sure if you can do the things you want to do.

Quinbo
12-31-10, 12:40 AM
I worked for AID for about a year. Those senior people who travel and go to meetings and etc. make a lot and I mean a lot of money. Surely pops could spring for a beater car and rent. Another thing of question. These world travelers that work for AID have a permanant residence somewhere. A nice apartment in Alexandria or something. They just don't pull up stakes when they pack a suitcase. Why can't you stay in his apartment? What college are you attending and how did you commute to it daily?

You want to join then join. If you are battling a college for reinstatement then stay in college. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Phantom Blooper
12-31-10, 04:53 AM
You can't have your cake and eat it too

You can....but you can't lick the bowl and spoon nowadays...sawbones said it is unhealthy.....

What good is cake if you can't eat it?

Make up your mind and get rid rid of your issues or stay in college until you have a better handle on life.

achilles097
12-31-10, 03:46 PM
I worked for AID for about a year. Those senior people who travel and go to meetings and etc. make a lot and I mean a lot of money. Surely pops could spring for a beater car and rent. Another thing of question. These world travelers that work for AID have a permanant residence somewhere. A nice apartment in Alexandria or something. They just don't pull up stakes when they pack a suitcase. Why can't you stay in his apartment? What college are you attending and how did you commute to it daily?

You want to join then join. If you are battling a college for reinstatement then stay in college. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

Where did you work for AID? My dad was a mission assistant director or director for a few countries and I lived in Senegal, Italy and Ethiopia but he's been in far more places than I have. We don't have the nice house in Alexandria, and he just sprung for a townhouse in South Arlington because he wanted affordable housing for when he's stateside. My dad is an accountant and we invested in the stock market and when the economy went south so did most of our money. I went to a prep school in New Hampshire for ice hockey and lacrosse which is where I met the Marine recruiters who said I had to be off meds for a year from 09-10, but that place took tons away from us as well.

As for the car situation...my dad parks at BWI and takes the keys. I have a license, maybe I'll work something out...He's more than willing to let me stay, he's only a little concerned because I haven't lived by myself. He hasn't accepted I need to think and work on my own terms. My dad is doing well so far, he's off the radiation treatment, but still takes the meds so he can ****. They caught the cancer early. And well, if somebody dies or is hospitalized, such as in my uncles case while i'm at boot camp, I'll remember he was one of the inspirations to become a Marine and that would only further my resolve... College was not going to work out regardless; my heart is not in education right now. It was there, it was convenient because I could meet new people, get somewhat of an education, and didn't involve me going overseas and ruining the chances of enlisting when that full year was up. I was promised PFC if I got 12 credits... but I just want to be a Marine.

I go to college at Lynchburg which is 3 hours south of the DC metro. I board there, not bad by itself. My academic advisor was a Captain in the Navy and worked in the nuclear submarine the USS Gato (SSN-615) and he said I would do well in the Marines.

I guess what I was wondering was if I should stay in college (if appeal is accepted) but knowing I have that open contract for ship date of May? I talked to a recruiter in my area in Virginia and he said there's a good chance I could get that AD spot with an infantry contract, but the ship date would be as late as August or October.