I'm trying to salvage my life after the Army, and don't know what to think any more.
I'm single, in my early 30s, have a STEM degree from a good school, and joined the Army because I wanted to protect my country, go on adventures, and be an all-american badass.
Since I went commissioned, the career path was supposed to be 'do the paperwork higher ranking officers don't want to do until they give you an opportunity to lead soldiers.' My unit was a little bad, so I got extra paperwork time, with the promise that I'd get leadership time eventually. Then, budget cuts hit, the Army was looking for excuses to axe people, and I found my career over before I ever got a chance to prove myself.
Now, no one wants to hire me at the professional level. I can get an hourly position fine. But, if I want to make 40k or higher, the only way I can get a job interview is to work with one of those JMO recruiters. When I work with them, they arrange some sort of hiring conference where myself and several of my 'peers' interview. But since their units didn't suck, my peers have objectively more marketable experience, and I never end up being the one with the job.
So my plan is..what? Work hourly until I grow old and die? I want to have a family some day, but that's not going to work if I'm making as much as a teenager until I'm in my 40s. On the plus side, I have no debts, but existing is not living.
We all have to live with our mistakes. I'm starting to think serving my country was a mistake.
I'm single, in my early 30s, have a STEM degree from a good school, and joined the Army because I wanted to protect my country, go on adventures, and be an all-american badass.
Since I went commissioned, the career path was supposed to be 'do the paperwork higher ranking officers don't want to do until they give you an opportunity to lead soldiers.' My unit was a little bad, so I got extra paperwork time, with the promise that I'd get leadership time eventually. Then, budget cuts hit, the Army was looking for excuses to axe people, and I found my career over before I ever got a chance to prove myself.
Now, no one wants to hire me at the professional level. I can get an hourly position fine. But, if I want to make 40k or higher, the only way I can get a job interview is to work with one of those JMO recruiters. When I work with them, they arrange some sort of hiring conference where myself and several of my 'peers' interview. But since their units didn't suck, my peers have objectively more marketable experience, and I never end up being the one with the job.
So my plan is..what? Work hourly until I grow old and die? I want to have a family some day, but that's not going to work if I'm making as much as a teenager until I'm in my 40s. On the plus side, I have no debts, but existing is not living.
We all have to live with our mistakes. I'm starting to think serving my country was a mistake.