You see, many moons ago while we were researching reserve units and drilling stations we became aware of two drilling stations that I would immediately be eligible for and a third that was only a matter of twelve miles farther than the original two but still outside of my state. When we asked my prior recruiter whether or not I would be able to drill at that station he originally said, "I don't know," then, "You'll need a distance waiver," then, "I'll check with my SSgt," then, "No," then, "What drilling stations were you looking at again?"
It was very frustrating.
Since my husband did six months in the Reserves after his time in Active Duty he had known plenty of Marines who were drilling long distances from their homes and so we knew that a distance waiver certainly was not unobtainable though no one seemed to know how to obtain one or the steps needed to even start the process of getting one. My recruiter was about as helpful as a heart attack and my husband and after getting almost nothing but snarky responses from Marine message boards my husband and I simply resorted to reading through the Marine Corps recruiting manual.
Still we could find no clear answers as to whether this third duty station (an Air Wing with many more technical MOSs available) was even an option for me.
But we figured we would give it a try with this new recruiter. Last night we asked him if this third drilling station would be an option for me and he explained it like this:
Because I am female I cannot drill in the two drilling stations in my state and I will need a distance waiver to go to the second two drilling stations anyway. The only issue with the third drilling station was that is was in another recruiting station and may mean my needing to be recruited from that station unless the Commanding Officer (CO) approved a distance waiver for me to go to that third drilling station which he would only do based on the benefit of my being there.
My recruiter said it wouldn't hurt to ask, however, and just before we left his office last night he wrote a note on my paperwork to ask his CO about the possibility of my being approved for a distance waiver to go to the Air Wing Unit.
We had to go back in to the office today and sign and have notarized documents that state that I will not be paying child support while at Recruit Training and that my husband will be the sole physical custodian of my son as well as a financial work up of our household and childcare for when we need to enroll in the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System (DEERS).
When we stepped in the door, we shook hands and my recruiter said, "I have some good news. I talked to the CO and he said it wouldn't be a problem for you to get approved for the Air Wing Unit so we'll start looking at what's available for MOSs up that direction too."
I think that even my husband was ready to give him a hug at that point.
This was one of the HUGE questions that we couldn't find an answer to and inside of sixteen hours my recruiter got me the answer that I needed (not to mention the answer that I was hoping for).
I filled out all of the medical screening forms and then we went down to the bank and had signed and notarized all of the custody paperwork. I also handed in my SF86 which is the paperwork for my FBI background check and security clearance. I've had it for four months and am finally glad to be rid of it.
The only thing left is the ASVAB and MEPS. I got a decent practice ASVAB score always getting 100% on the Vocabulary, Paragraph Comprehension and Mathematical Knowledge portions, but I wasn't happy with my arithmetic reasoning so I've been studying like crazy these last couple of nights to hopefully boost my final Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT) score.
My recruiter wants me off to MEPS hopefully this upcoming week provided we can find childcare for that time while I'm gone and my husband is at work.
The sooner the better!
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