For some crazy reason my husband is always saying that I drink the "Army Kool-Aid". It took me a while to catch on. When my husband (Luke) started thinking he wanted to go on this Army adventure he mentioned that it is really hard on the wife and family. Some deal with it better than others. He was very clear with me that things in the Army do not always go as planned. This is true for training commands as well. If you husband is in Basic or OCS that is a training command also called TRADOC. Sometimes it seams that the instructors change things just to change things and that is very frustrating. Your soldier will never come home on time! You will never be able to predict it. Please dont be mad at them or the Army. This is just the way it is so embrace it.
Plans will always change. Example; We had orders to TDY to Ft. Gordon in Augusta, GA for BOLCB with follow-on orders to Ft. Lewis, WA. We were very excited to be PCS'ed to Ft. Lewis. There was another person in the class that originally had PCS orders to Japan but they switched him to Ft. Richardson, AK. He really did not want to go to Alaska and we did. My husband offered to switch with him and it was approved. A week letter my husband gets a call from some lady in Alaska saying that she needed more information to process his diversion paperwork. Luke asked "what diversion"? They were switching us to Ft. Wainwright, AK in Fairbanks. Fairbanks has an hour less light in the winter and is much colder in the winter. They town south of Fairbanks is North Pole, AK. All I am thinking is how small the population is and I can just feel my vitamin D levels plummet. Brrr. I then had to drink two cups of HOOAH and then I was fine.
As family members we are all a part of the Army too. Have some fun with it. I make lots of jokes now that the north pole where Santa lives will be south of us! We did not join the Army to live in the same place and never go anywhere. Georgia and the south has been a great experience for us. It is totally out of our comfort zone and we have grown from it. I typically do not taught the word "change" but enjoy the change while you are in the Army and don't complain because that just makes it harder for the other soldiers and families around you.
Remind me to drink some kool-aid if they change our orders again. They always could!
Key Terms:
BOLCB- Basic Officer Leadership Course and the B stands for the class after your commissioning course
TDY- Temporary Duty Something
PCS- Permanent Change of Station
TRADOC- Training Command
RFO- Request for Orders (this tells you where you are headed but are not the final orders you would take to transportation)
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