Expert: James Bell - 11/8/2007

Question
Hi sir, I know you probably get asked alot about the time spent away from station and family. I am a SSgt TDY in Kandahar, Afgan right now and I have the opportunity to crosstrain into loadmaster. I always here that load masters are always gone, where every they may be going. I am married mil to mil and I have a family, I am just concerned about always being away, well atleast my wife is. I guess I am look for alittle help or advise I dont know. I would appreciate anything on the career field thanks in advance.

Answer
Greetings Cole -

I can't make any promises on any career field in today's deployment oriented military.  But, you are deployed right now, and I'm sure it's not for a short amount of time.  Will you deploy as a loadmaster, yes, but your rotations are usually shorter, and you travel more instead of just staying in the same location.  There are obviously trade off's.

I can't tell you what would be the best course of action because I don't know what your interests are.  I loved flying, and did so for 24 years.  I deployed a lot in tankers, but not so much in cargo planes.  The question you have to answer is how happy are you in your current job to change to something else?

While retraining you will be in school.  You will be away from your family for several months, but you will be stateside and not in a foreign country or combat zone.  While you are in mission ready training, you will transit combat areas, but will be non-deployable until fully mission ready.  That total time can be upwards of a year.  That gives you more time at home.  Once you are mission ready, then you are as eligible for missions and deployments as the next loadmaster in your squadron.

I don't know if I've helped ou or not, but I wanted to paint a realistic picture to help you make an informed decision, and not paint a rosey picture of a perfect career.  Being a dual military family, I'm sure you and your wife are both used to separation and diversity.  I think it's those experiences that make military marriages strong.

The best advice I can give you is to ask personal experiences from the squadron you may be assigned, if you know or have a choice.  You and your wife have a lot to consider, and a lot to discuss.  I hope I can answer more questions as they pop up, so please don't hesitate to ask again if you wish.  Military life is hard enough as it is, and my goal on AllExperts is to try and use my experiences to help people make educated decisions to tough questions.

Sincerely,
James Bell