Single mom now facing medical release from military

[dimsum]

Maybe they should make MARS a sub-specialty. You join as a LogO, then go MARS (Log-M), and if you can't hack it as a MARS Officer, you just revert back to Log.

Or we could change the whole structure, and make MARS, Log and Engineering all start at the same point, and then they could all sub-specialize from there. We could call it something generic, like... Surface Warfare Officer. And then you could sub-specialize for Operations, Logistics, or Engineering................................

Shhh....don't give people ideas.

 

[ballz]

As long as there's yelling, you're getting 90% of the training benefit.

But seriously, this isn't MARS-specific. MARS is a good example, but certainly not the only trade training people medicalize out of when VOT/VR is blocked.

Plenty of cases of the green welfare program at the Inf School.... I know of guys that had been on PAT Pl for literally 5 years as a 2Lt before they could get rid of them.

 

[daftandbarmy]

As an organization CAF just needs to be more flexible in VOT and, frankly, VR before contracts are over.

Because you know what happens when we're not? These people medicalize and get out anyways, only with a med pension. There was nothing organically wrong with this woman, her life circumstances changed to where MARS really was a bad fit, she couldn't find another way out and went the med route (and once she rang that bell, she couldn't unring it at will - that's the part where the MO didn’t sign off on the transfer, because no MO would).

From my experience on the coast MARS trg is especially bad at this "they succeed or they break" mentality. Just let them go if they want to go - it ends up being more expensive to the system to hold them until they break. *That's* where we need more flex, and that's not single-parent specific.

Training people to kill other people, without getting killed yourself, sounds really tricky. Maybe we should just forget it  

 

[Nudibranch]

Training people to kill other people, without getting killed yourself, sounds really tricky. Maybe we should just forget it

We certainly ought to when the person being trained decides this just isn't for them, to the point of seeking escape to the JPSU.
If we let them go slightly before that point, we might at least end up with a functional paper pusher.

 

[Lightguns]

We certainly ought to when the person being trained decides this just isn't for them, to the point of seeking escape to the JPSU.
If we let them go slightly before that point, we might at least end up with a functional paper pusher.

Did you miss the last decade?  There ain't no rear areas.

 

[Nudibranch]

Did you miss the last decade?  There ain't no rear areas.

Did you miss reality? There are a lot areas that don't deploy at the rate that the Navy does - I've had 2.5 deployments  in 8 years, and if anything I actively seek to go.

 

[Remius]

Did you miss reality? There are a lot areas that don't deploy at the rate that the Navy does -

public service?

 

[Lightguns]

public service?

That likely would have been the best place, putting your deployment problems in the log br only makes things tougher for the now fewer deployable people in the log br.  The same goes for any other branch or corps, no trade should be a dumping ground. 

 

[Journeyman]

Did you miss the last decade?  There ain't no rear areas.

Ah, well that explains the CADPAT with well-worn butts in Ottawa.    :nod:

 

[Lightguns]

Ah, well that explains the CADPAT with well-worn butts in Ottawa.    :nod:

Perhaps, and, heading down a rat hole, but I also recall a casualty within the line of sight of those well worn butts.  CADPAT, well worn or new makes you a target right here at home, in this current international struggle.  I concur with you and can recall an RCAF signals officer who arrived as a 2Lt and retired LCol having worked nowhere in the CF but 101 Colonel By Drive, that's a failure of command.  Again, though, there is little room on the "purple" trades for accommodating desk riders who cannot be employed operationally because of their own personal circumstances, it leaves the rest more over tasked, more stress and creates additional family stress for those who serve unconditionally. 

 

[gryphonv]

Just a thought, and its a bit off the topic.

But would it be feasible of having a support tier (maybe new reservist class) that is never asked to deploy, but still technically be military) Maybe like a National Guard. . This could help limit the public service component, give an easier way to transition permanently broken troops without having to medical them out of the system (not all people on medical want to leave).

I know reservist only deploy if they volunteer (under current rules). But I feel we currently have way too many intelligent people with great skills, lose their job and be sent away because they became broken in some way, or can't meet some part of universality of service.

 

[Nudibranch]

I know reservist only deploy if they volunteer (under current rules). But I feel we currently have way too many intelligent people with great skills, lose their job and be sent away because they became broken in some way.

I think a long (even very long) period of accommodation for those trained useful people should be considered, for as long as they can work within their MELs. So they could stay employed within RegF on accommodation, without actually erasing the Universality of Service line in the sand (which IMO it would be a disaster to relax).

Untrained assets and people who are too ill to work effectively, or those the CAF doesn’t need, would be released within the usual timeline.

We do have an accommodation period for those on release PCATs currently but it tops out at 3 yrs I think.

 

[gryphonv]

We do have an accommodation period for those on release PCATs currently but it tops out at 3 yrs I think.

Yeah when I was released it was 3 years, but you had to ask for it, and it wasn't guaranteed. It could be denied or approved for any number of reasons, not always making sense.

 

[CountDC]

Accommodation can be done but does have to be carefully managed.  If too many are done then you end up deploying the same people and eventually they will burn out and become accommodation cases so eventually you have no one left to deploy.

VOT to log would have required her to go to Borden for trade training so she would have had the same issue thus not a complete solution. For some "I  am a single parent" has become a mantra to mean I shouldn't be sent anywhere or made to work hours I don't want to.

As far as the child goes - many single parents in the military are dealing and have been for years. 

Assistance is available and was at the time.

Ref: CBI 209.335 Family Care Assistance (effective Jun 2003)

FCA is designed to help offset child and family care costs incurred by the CF member in excess of those costs paid during normal working hours. FCA is a non-taxable benefit, which is limited to single members and service couples. 

Seems to me there is more to this story than we are getting out of the article.

 

[Navy_Pete]

This is a shitty situation, and I feel bad for her, but she was in a hard sea trade and didn't have a family care plan that would have allowed her to even reach her basic qual.  That can take several years with a lot of time away for MARS.  VOT may have been an option, but for the doctor to not sign off on it, there was probably a pretty significant reason.

I've had a few sailors that have gotten out due to similar changes in their family situation.  You can accommodate them up to a certain point when they are trained and can go for instructor positions etc, but you can't run the same people into the ground all the time with all the sea time and get larger retention problems (which we already have for a lot of trades).

It's unfortunate, but the life isn't for everyone, and not everyone can be accommodated indefinitely.  I'm sure there is more to the story, so won't comment either way.  Hopefully in the long run this works out for her for the better; it sounds like she was probably going to great lengths to try and make it happen and that must have been a huge amount of extra stress.

 

[Strike]

This is why I come here.  This has to be the most varied and well thought out replies to this article I've seen online thus far.

Here's my take:

1.  We have to be careful to use the whole "I was able to manage so she should be able to" BS.  Or any variation thereof. ("I know lots of people that make it work.")  You know what?  I know lots of people that make their marriages work, or can co-parent with their Ex, or get along with their Ex or whatever.  But I don't discount anyone who is having relationship issues or going through a bad divorce because of it.  Because everyone brings something different to the mix and everyone's issues are unique.

2.  Unfortunately (and I say this with all due respect to the Navy, especially as I have a family member who is there) the MARS/MARE training system is messed up.  When I read this article my first thought was "Not again."  I have a colleague who went through a similar issue - not a single parent thing, but just being treated like crap when her training wasn't going well and she tried transferring to a trade better suited to her.  It resulted in an HRC where it was found that many of her documents had been destroyed or altered for no other reason than to keep her from transferring to another trade that had been very proactive in trying to help her.  I have another who also had a huge uphill battle to remuster to AERE because, again, when her training on the Navy side wasn't going well, she tried to be proactive and find something better suited.  She was still under obligatory service and didn't want to spend her remaining time as a make-work project when she could get qualified somewhere else and be useful.

Don't forget - she wasn't pregnant when she started training.  She also didn't expect to have to raise her child alone.  We can easily bring up that her parents should still be able to take care of her son when she's away, but they also still work full time and he's now school age.  Let's also examine the timeline:
9 months on shore while pregnant;
A year off for MATA/PATA; (1 yr, 9 m)
At least another 6 months on shore after returning while waiting for her paperwork to come through taking her off TCAT; (2 yr, 3 m)
6 months everything is good (it's an assumption - 2 yr, 6 m)
6 months trying to deal with the split (another assumption based on the article stating that her relationship fell apart after 2 years - 2 yr, 9 m)

Let's include training delays trying to fit her into a course, time off due to MH reasons (because I'm sure anyone who has ever split with someone, especially when they have a small child, would agree that it takes a huge mental toll), and right there you're probably talking at least 3.5-4 yrs without being in a fixed training stream.

If she's ROTP and paid back her pension after her MATA/PATA and she's quickly coming to the end of her obligatory service.  So it would be easier, administratively, for the Navy to let her bleed off her time than to try and get her into a new trade.  Looking at her initial timeline in the article, she likely joined as DEO, but just thought it might be something else to think about.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Did you miss the last decade?  There ain't no rear areas.

Especially on a warship, or in a jet, or behind a bayonet, or something like that.

Which is why we've probably sold a couple of generations of people a bill of goods by claiming that you can have a well balanced work/ family life while training to fight and win modern wars. This is largely BS, of course.

This woman is likely a victim of fraud of the highest order, I would argue, perpetrated by a couple of decades worth of various kinds of civilian, and civilianized, managers of a military that is trying to be one thing to its civilian population, and quite another to the increasingly dizzy array of modern, well equipped, cunning and wholly ruthless adversaries we face around the globe.

'Charlie's idea of R&R was a little rat meat mixed into his rice'... indeed. We would do well to remind ourselves of that from time to time or the ones who will suffer most will, of course, be the thousands of misled teenagers we commit to the next global conflict.

 

[Halifax Tar]

Especially on a warship, or in a jet, or behind a bayonet, or something like that.

Which is why we've probably sold a couple of generations of people a bill of goods by claiming that you can have a well balanced work/ family life while training to fight and win modern wars. This is largely BS, of course.

This woman is likely a victim of fraud of the highest order, I would argue, perpetrated by a couple of decades worth of various kinds of civilian, and civilianized, managers of a military that is trying to be one thing to its civilian population, and quite another to the increasingly dizzy array of modern, well equipped, cunning and wholly ruthless adversaries we face around the globe.

'Charlie's idea of R&R was a little rat meat mixed into his rice'... indeed. We would do well to remind ourselves of that from time to time or the ones who will suffer most will, of course, be the thousands of misled teenagers we commit to the next global conflict.

:goodpost:

 

[Jarnhamar]

1.  We have to be careful to use the whole "I was able to manage so she should be able to" BS.  Or any variation thereof.

Yup that's brutal. When you have a CSM telling you he's single and has no kids so he doesn't care about your family problems. "You chose to have a wife and kids, you don't see me with those problems do you?".  Nope. And you'll be the only one at your DWD party too.

2.  It resulted in an HRC where it was found that many of her documents had been destroyed or altered for no other reason than to keep her from transferring to another trade that had been very proactive in trying to help her.

The military sure can be vengeful. It's amazing how much power the chain of command has to utterly ruin someones life or turn it upside down because a CFTPO task needs a name.



I'm all about supporting and helping families and I've on occasion treated mbrs with families different to try and accommodate them but on the other spectrum I've seen how unfair that can be too.  Someone doesn't have their life sorted out so other people pick up the slack, including (I've seen) someone do 3 back to back to back deployments. I think there comes a point where the economy of effort of supporting one soldier at the cost of multiple others isn't worth it.

 

[Kat Stevens]

I sympathize with this woman, truly, and it sounds to me like she's been fucked over by the system, or certain butt nuggets within it.  As far as expectations go, when I joined in 1979 as a dumb 18 year old, I expected to be CDS when I was 40. Turns out, I was right, but CDS stood for Corporal Driving Some officer. Anyone who joins with expectations will most assuredly have karma take a giant shit on them.