sancona
04-07-09, 03:28 PM
Hey all,
My name is Scott and I'm new to this forum, just looking for some extra information. Here's my problem: I am currently a senior in college and I am about to complete my degree. I wanted to enlist before I went to college but my mom talked me out of it and told me to finish my degree first and then decide from there. I went to school and really enjoyed it, but felt that something was missing and I still wanted to join the corps. I talked to my parents about it again about 6 mos ago, once I really got serious about it. My goal is to attend OCS the summer after my senior year (this june). I have had 2 close friends go through the program and it seems to be exactly what I am looking for. Here's where the **** really hits the fan though. Last May I began training daily, running, weight training and I cut out my bad habbits like smoking, in order to be in good enough shape to not completely destroy my legs during ocs. I came into this school year in the best shape of my entire life, I put on 20 pounds, (up to 150 from a measly 130) and then in October I got the worst news of my life. I had severe stomache pain for 8 days to the point where I could barely sit up in bed. I went to the hospital and they told me I had infectious colllitis, which generally would not be a problem or require a medical waiver for the marines...the only problem was that they noticed tumors growing on my insides while they were checking the collitis out. Turns out I have Neurofibromatosis ( a nerve disorder that will disqualify me from joining, without a waiver). The whole thing with this though is that I have ZERO physical limitations from the disorder. In fact, had I never gotten collitis, I would have never known that I even had the disorder. I have zero external signs of the disorder, the tumors only grow on my insides. Here's another problem: I had surgery because they thought that there were tumors in places that there turned out to be no tumors. So nothing was removed during the surgery, simply exploratory. I lost a lot of weight because I was unable to eat anything for 3 weeks due to the collitis ( bad case). Since then, I have put all the weight back on and continued training just as hard as before. I am once again in the best shape of my life and I have a meeting coming up this Monday (april 13th) to discuss the disorder and my chances of getting a waiver. My friend set the meeting up for me because he is working in the office right now, and its generally pretty difficult to get a personal meeting with the person that I am meeting with. They know that I have NF1, they are basically going to determine the severity of it and where to go from here. I'm wondering if there is ANYTHING at all that I can do to increase my chances of getting a waiver. Would the fact that I have a college degree play a role? Or that I have 1100 SAT scores? I'm just nervous that I am going to say one thing wrong, or forget to do something that could potentially help me, and then my chances of getting a waiver will be screwed forever and I will be incredibly ****ed off. I know that once one recruiting office denies me, I will be in the computer system for all the recruiting offices within the marines. I can alwas try a dif branch, but cmon now...If I have to I will, but I'm trying to maximize my chances here. Any help or suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated. Thanks all in advance, and remember my meeting is on Monday so time is of the essence. I have searched all over the internet for answers and I have found some helpful information, but I figured I'd ask here too and see if anyone had a personal experience with it similar to mine. THANKS!!!
-Scott
My name is Scott and I'm new to this forum, just looking for some extra information. Here's my problem: I am currently a senior in college and I am about to complete my degree. I wanted to enlist before I went to college but my mom talked me out of it and told me to finish my degree first and then decide from there. I went to school and really enjoyed it, but felt that something was missing and I still wanted to join the corps. I talked to my parents about it again about 6 mos ago, once I really got serious about it. My goal is to attend OCS the summer after my senior year (this june). I have had 2 close friends go through the program and it seems to be exactly what I am looking for. Here's where the **** really hits the fan though. Last May I began training daily, running, weight training and I cut out my bad habbits like smoking, in order to be in good enough shape to not completely destroy my legs during ocs. I came into this school year in the best shape of my entire life, I put on 20 pounds, (up to 150 from a measly 130) and then in October I got the worst news of my life. I had severe stomache pain for 8 days to the point where I could barely sit up in bed. I went to the hospital and they told me I had infectious colllitis, which generally would not be a problem or require a medical waiver for the marines...the only problem was that they noticed tumors growing on my insides while they were checking the collitis out. Turns out I have Neurofibromatosis ( a nerve disorder that will disqualify me from joining, without a waiver). The whole thing with this though is that I have ZERO physical limitations from the disorder. In fact, had I never gotten collitis, I would have never known that I even had the disorder. I have zero external signs of the disorder, the tumors only grow on my insides. Here's another problem: I had surgery because they thought that there were tumors in places that there turned out to be no tumors. So nothing was removed during the surgery, simply exploratory. I lost a lot of weight because I was unable to eat anything for 3 weeks due to the collitis ( bad case). Since then, I have put all the weight back on and continued training just as hard as before. I am once again in the best shape of my life and I have a meeting coming up this Monday (april 13th) to discuss the disorder and my chances of getting a waiver. My friend set the meeting up for me because he is working in the office right now, and its generally pretty difficult to get a personal meeting with the person that I am meeting with. They know that I have NF1, they are basically going to determine the severity of it and where to go from here. I'm wondering if there is ANYTHING at all that I can do to increase my chances of getting a waiver. Would the fact that I have a college degree play a role? Or that I have 1100 SAT scores? I'm just nervous that I am going to say one thing wrong, or forget to do something that could potentially help me, and then my chances of getting a waiver will be screwed forever and I will be incredibly ****ed off. I know that once one recruiting office denies me, I will be in the computer system for all the recruiting offices within the marines. I can alwas try a dif branch, but cmon now...If I have to I will, but I'm trying to maximize my chances here. Any help or suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated. Thanks all in advance, and remember my meeting is on Monday so time is of the essence. I have searched all over the internet for answers and I have found some helpful information, but I figured I'd ask here too and see if anyone had a personal experience with it similar to mine. THANKS!!!
-Scott