Mil to Mil Naval Aviators

[BobChuck]

Hello Airwarriors - I'm an SNA moving through the pipeline with an eye on the future. I'm older than most folks in this stage (thanks to the recent increase to 31.5) and am doing my best to prepare for the future and family, in the event the opportunity presents itself. I've come here seeking advice/opinions/personal antidotes on marrying Mil to Mil, specifically another Naval Aviator early on in the training pipeline. I searched the forum and didn't find much specifically pertaining to this, so my apologies in advance if I missed it.

• Is this even possible, and how would it work if my 'spouse' and I selected different platforms with different duty stations? (F-35's and P8's, for example)
• Does being married before selection at Primary have any impact on selecting a platform? I know this one's a long shot but have to ask...
• In a perfect world, what would be the optimal platform selection for us? Both P8's?

Any personal antidotes or additional info are extremely welcome. This is a theoretical situation I'm looking for info on.

Sincerely appreciate your time and responses in advance. Thank you.

 

[insanebikerboy]

I’ve personally known two mil-mil couples. Both couples flew the same platform (helos). Couple A both made command, and couple B are both on their way to at least O-5.

All were super hardworking, got some breaks on good timing, but definitely had to make job and personal choices that were less than desirable.

It is doable.

 

[IKE]

I'm not mil-mil, and marriage is hard enough. Based on mil-mil couples I've seen (from dual Navy Helo to Navy-Marine helo-jet), my advice would be:

Have some serious f'ing discussions about kids, location, career aspirations, and anything else you can think of. Examples of where this can have effects:

• Co-location is not guaranteed, and one or both of you may have to make a career sacrifice later to ensure it (e.g., both taking orders to CNATRA vice FRS or one taking non-flying).
• Are you okay with a tour (or two) of not living together? How does that look/work?
• Niche career aspirations (NAWDC, TPS, etc.) can make Colo machinations very difficult.
• Mil-mil money is sweet, especially if you both retire as O-5+, but what if one of you tires of service? Is the one who leaves going to want location permanence for their new career?
• You gonna be okay if she gets the #1 EP in her JO tour and you squeak by with the bottom EP? Could be awkward depending on your level of enculturation in traditional values. If it doesn't matter at all, good.
• Kids? The new career intermission program may help with this, but kids will absolutely affect considerations of location and quality of life when looking at orders.

Lastly, some unsolicited marriage advice. I think commissioning and flight school are heady times, where one often feels a euphoric sense of everything going right and/or moving forward. Don't let that interfere with your ability to judge the rightness of a mate. IMO, the principle of "F*** Yes, or No" applies.

 

[SynixMan]

Anecdotally as far as I know, having worked in a CNATRA squadron:

-Has zero bearing for selection out of primary
-Has maybe a small chance of effecting coastal duty location out of advanced if you’re actually married. Like: one in VP gets to stay in Jax, one in HSM gets Mayport. I’ve also heard “Whidbey and Pt Magu are the same coast, be happy”
-Helo and “other” is the happiest way I’ve heard it, as the helo bases are “near-ish” another platform base (except VAQ)
-Very real possibility it has zero bearing and one gets Jax and one Japan/Guam/Hawaii

EVEN IF you manage same community, same base, expect to rarely see each other your first tour between work ups, dets, deployments, etc. It’s really tough and flight school doesn’t really prepare you for what life is like as a fleet JO.

I’m by no means discouraging you, but it’s tough and getting the Escambia courthouse wedding is my no means a panacea. I’ve seen it work and also implode, badly. I’ve also seen people wait until after their JO tour to make sure it can work before actually getting married.

 

[zippy]

Hello Airwarriors - I'm an SNA moving through the pipeline with an eye on the future. I'm older than most folks in this stage (thanks to the recent increase to 31.5) and am doing my best to prepare for the future and family, in the event the opportunity presents itself. I've come here seeking advice/opinions/personal antidotes on marrying Mil to Mil, specifically another Naval Aviator early on in the training pipeline. I searched the forum and didn't find much specifically pertaining to this, so my apologies in advance if I missed it.

• Is this even possible, and how would it work if my 'spouse' and I selected different platforms with different duty stations? (F-35's and P8's, for example)
• Does being married before selection at Primary have any impact on selecting a platform? I know this one's a long shot but have to ask...
• In a perfect world, what would be the optimal platform selection for us? Both P8's?

Any personal antidotes or additional info are extremely welcome. This is a theoretical situation I'm looking for info on.y

Sincerely appreciate your time and responses in advance. Thank you.

Doable but dicey.

Being married in flight school won’t necessarily put you both in the same community. Make sure it’s noted and requested but don’t have your heart set on it.
Unless things changed they’re not going to officially take spousal co-location into account until after wings/ FRS. F35 and P8 wouldn’t work but P8/Growler, Hornet/HSC, P8/HSM, HSC/HM, HSC/HSM etc. would. Helo/Helo would probably give the most colocation options due to multiple helo communities in major fleet concentration areas. After that you’ll have about the same ease, with maybe P8s or EP3/P8 working better.

In the same community, there will often be issues matching up deployment cycles so often one spouse will leave and come back and then the other will be just about to leave.

Unless you decide to put one of the careers on the back burner and have them take orders to follow the other around, it’ll be tough. Also, the one up for orders first (regardless of career potential) will set the tone for PCSs. Depending on personalities that can cause a lot of friction in the relationship. For example, there was a dual mil couple where a Growler XO divorced their spouse from another community out of fear that their spouse’s PCS cycle being about a year earlier and EMFP restrictions of their child was going to prevent the Growler XO from getting the command tour they wanted.

If both are on the golden path and have similar timing most likely say goodbye to kids and sometimes one will get OP-T CO while the other gets Operational command which often aren’t in the same location. There was a CO in the VTs whose spouse was a VP CO. The closest they could get was Jax/Whiting for their CO tours.

I’ve got other friends who were dual mil couples. In each, one got out at MSR and followed the other around, they’ve had children, a more stable home life. The spouses that stayed in are in their command tours.

 

[nittany03]

For example, there was a dual mil couple where a Growler XO divorced their spouse from another community out of fear that their spouse’s PCS cycle being about a year earlier and EMFP restrictions of their child was going to prevent the Growler XO from getting the command tour they wanted.

. . . Good God, that is fucking cold . . .

 

[BigRed389]

. . . Good God, that is fucking cold . . .

This would be the biggest downside to mil to mil relationships I would think.

A lot harder to keep your personal life problems from bleeding into your professional life, and when it does, a lot more people are going to know about it.

Plenty that make it work, but when it does go bad, it can torch spectacularly.

 

[nittany03]

This would be the biggest downside to mil to mil relationships I would think.

A lot harder to keep your personal life problems from bleeding into your professional life, and when it does, a lot more people are going to know about it.

Plenty that make it work, but when it does go bad, it can torch spectacularly.

I'm out of the loop as to who that individual may be, and wouldn't spill deets in public if I wasn't. But though I may be a bachelor myself at the moment, one of the wisest pieces of advice I've ever gotten over the years is "your job will never love you back," and it's the stone cold truth. Works for military and civilian jobs, no matter what you wear on your shoulders, collar, and/or sleeves.

In 15 years, no one who matters is going to give a shit what command tour you got or didn't get. My civilian co-workers and friends don't need to look at my FITREP breakout to decide whether or not to respect me, and my family sure as hell doesn't care.

 

[Swanee]

Here's the thing man- Marriage isn't easy. But you can't really control who you fall in love with. The best you can do is get married and hope that your relationship can survive the distance and stress of being Naval Aviators in different squadrons.


There are plenty of other jobs in the civilian world that have similar challenges.

It's not about whether it's possible or not- it's about whether you are willing to deal with whatever comes at you and your spouse for the rest of your lives.

 

[Jim123]

 

[AllAmerican75]

From my own personal experience and from watching the experiences of my friends, mil-to-mil marriages will often end poorly unless one party is willing to get out or go Reserves. Marriage while in the military is hard enough but when you only see each other every few months, it becomes nearly impossible to carry on a meaningful relationship. At one point, I was only seeing my ex once every other month and I know some folks who ended up on diametrically opposed deployment schedules and literally only saw each other once during an entire year.

Unlike the enlisted folks, the Navy does not give a flying fuck about co-locating officers, especially URL and operational types. I've seen some drug deals made for Restricted Line and Staff/Medical Corps folks, but these were all officers who were already qualified with warfare pins (EDOs, IPs, HR, etc.) and were trying to line up PCS dates and make time to have kids. As a new ensign or JG in an operational unit, you're going to be balls-to-the-wall getting your quals and hitting the wickets necessary to keep moving your career along so you have a shot at getting screened for DH and O4. Your wife/husband/flying purple people eater will have the same challenges and the Navy is going to put you two where you're needed to ensure you meet the rights wickets and check the right boxes so you have a shot at O5 command, which is what URL careers are set up for.

No matter what happens, you will eventually have to choose whose career comes first. Only you know if that's something that both you and your spouse are okay living with.

 

[zippy]

I'm out of the loop as to who that individual may be, and wouldn't spill deets in public if I wasn't. But though I may be a bachelor myself at the moment, one of the wisest pieces of advice I've ever gotten over the years is "your job will never love you back," and it's the stone cold truth. Works for military and civilian jobs, no matter what you wear on your shoulders, collar, and/or sleeves.

In 15 years, no one who matters is going to give a shit what command tour you got or didn't get. My civilian co-workers and friends don't need to look at my FITREP breakout to decide whether or not to respect me, and my family sure as hell doesn't care.

Yeah, that particular XO has plenty of notoriety around the NUW for work related reasons, which would often lead them to calling their ex on cruise to lament about how much the ready room and just about everyone else hates them.

Not the first time someone I knew in the military got married/divorced for professional goals either. People to get their partner health insurance, a career minded VP O4 who was concerned that he’d be penalized by the appearance that he was a bachelor in the front office, Enlisted folks to move out of the barracks or off the boat etc.

When I was a VT IP, one of my Marine students got married and divorced within a year or so. Turns out his Air Force wife thought she’d have a better chance of getting jets being married to another service member (due to basing locations and spousal co-location- I still haven’t figured out what she was smoking), and divorced him after selection when it didn’t pan out. That situation is what this thread reminds me of.

To the OP, unfortunately for many people, Active duty overwhelms the work/life balance and drills hard into self identity and self worth. That has an effect over time on an individual and their family unit. Doubly so when there’s two Active duty spouses. Often the person going through flight school now doesn’t end up being the same person after their fleet tour, and two type A personalities in the same industry often clash. It’s next level when the competition comes home with you and invades everyday life there too. It can get pretty gnarly until the point that one of the spouses is taken off the golden path and accepts it.

I’ve got another buddy who is doing the inter-service dual mil helicopter thing. After community selection and wings out of advanced one of the spouses developed a chip on their shoulder about the importance/tip of the spear-ness of their community and used to pick fights with their spouse about it compared to the spouses community during the FRS. It was very peculiar and lasted for a couple of years. Apparently the makeup sex was great, and the harsh realities of fleet life wore down the combative spouse and things are fine now, but like many other examples, one spouse took a non career path job while the other went to TPS, even though the TPS spouse wants to get out.

Clear communication about relationship and professional goals are important when dealing with two career professionals, whether they be dual service, dual military or dual professional. Whatever you do, don’t get married only because you think it’ll further your professional life. It might, but there’s a real good chance it’ll make your life Hell and you’ll get divorced anyways. Save your money.

 

[Brett327]

Or, just don't ever get married and live a fulfilling life of decadent, unfettered hedonism.

 

[Griz882]

When I was a VT IP, one of my Marine students got married and divorced within a year or so. Turns out his Air Force wife thought she’d have a better chance of getting jets being married to another service member....

This only works 42% of the time.

 

[nittany03]

When I was a VT IP, one of my Marine students got married and divorced within a year or so. Turns out his Air Force wife thought she’d have a better chance of getting jets being married to another service member (due to basing locations and spousal co-location- I still haven’t figured out what she was smoking), and divorced him after selection when it didn’t pan out.

I love how after 17 years and 4 months, every time I think I've seen the apotheosis of military bizarritude, I still end up getting proven wrong.