In my case, Hubbs and I have had our whole lives switched up in the last year because his tentative orders had been changed. Last May (2011), he found out that he had been selected for a rated slot, so our first stop would have been in sunny Florida for training immediately after graduation (this past May 2012). Well, we had that mindset for a good 9 months, and when he hadn't gotten his orders by the time everyone else was receiving them, he got worried and went to go find out what was wrong. Somewhere along the lines, it got lost in the paperwork that his job had been changed. No one bothered to let us know, and he was now unassigned, and was given 24 hours to create a new dream sheet of bases. Then we waited around for another 2 months for them to tell us [good news] that they found us a home, but [bad news] it wasn't any of the bases we put on our dream sheet.
Everything in this whole entering Active Duty process has been a waiting game full of "tentative" information. Here we are-- 3 months after graduation and we're tentatively supposed to be starting our new life next month, but nothing's official!
It makes me so crazy that even once he gets his official orders, things are still liable to change up until the very last minute. Like, everything can change: job, base, date. Nothing's official til he gets to where he's going and he reports in. So frustrating, right?!
I can't give my current employer a specific date that I'll be leaving, and I can't even look for a new job. I'm not going to waste my time researching job opportunities in a specific area if there's any possibility that I may not end up there. We can't tell our families what to expect for our lives in the coming future, and we can't tell our current landlord when we'll be moving out-- thank goodness he's totally cool and flexible.
I'm worried that the transition is going to be very last-minute and stressful. I've posted before about being a planner, and if the Air Force decides to only give me 3 days notice of what's happening, I'm going to have a freak-out. It would be exciting, definitely, but it makes me crazy thinking that that could actually happen!
Does anyone out there have a fun story they'd like to share about having to pack up and leave (or deal with the military changing plans) at a moment's notice?
How do you deal with the stress of not knowing what the military has in store for you and your family's near future?
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