Well there are generally two kinds of people with military experience that I've talked to. There are those who hate it and have nothing but bad things to say about it, and those who love it, and only have a few negative things to say about it. Generally those who hate it didn't put much thought into what they wanted to accomplish in the military, and ended up with a crap MOS. From what people have told me, it's almost all what you make of it. If you dedicate yourself to it, just like any other job, you can make a decent living and still get a lot out of it.
The pay may not be extraordinary, but when you factor out all of the cost of living expenses that they cover for you or help you out with, you're still pocketing a lot more money than your average McDonald's employee. As for the relationships, I've known several people to keep strong relationships with their girlfriends or wives, but I've known of a few people who's relationships didn't hold up to the stress. Obviously that kind of thing is going to take some extra work from both sides, and if both of you aren't willing to put in that extra work, maybe the failure of the relationship is a good thing.
As for basic, I've only encountered one person so far that told me basic was hell. Everyone else has told me pretty much the same thing, that there are a few rough spots, but overall it's pretty fun. The thing that most people stress is that you've got to be able to keep your cool and not take it personally when the DS screams at you. Once again, just like anything else, it depends on the attitude that you have when you go.
All of this is pretty much what I've been told by a fair number of good friends or acquaintances, but the fact that almost all of them had very similar feelings about military life makes it seem like pretty believable information to me.
Shinysides, if you really feel like the military is the right choice for you, go for it. Just be careful and make sure that you end up with a good job that you can do something with once you're out. Oh yeah and don't get shot please.
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