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Has anyone else left family at home while at WOFT?


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Brand new to this forum. Got here from reddit.com/r/armyaviation. Sorry if this is the wrong place for it.

The biggest hurdle in deciding to pursue WOFT or not is the actual time in Rucker. I know it's a temporary hardship for long term gains, but it's going to be rough. Currently 31B in the national guard. Been in 8 years. Wife, soon to be 2 kids, great civilian job, house, etc. I don't see how, between our mortgage, her job, and kids school, they could move to Rucker with me; But then it's 12 to however many months away from them. Obviously everyones relationship and parenting style is different, but has anyone in a similar situation done this? Guess I'm just looking for a success story or advice if anyone has either. Thanks!

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It all depends on how your family handles it. Which state are you from? If you’re close to Alabama it may work fairly well for you. I have a friend who’s family is in a state close by and he goes home often. If you think it will be ok on your family for you to be gone for a year or two then shoot for it. 

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My wife and I are trying to plan this right now if I'm picked up on Jan board. 

I'm AD AF stationed 3 hours away from rucker, where wife is settled and 3 kids are in school. But my parents live 5 hours from rucker, so the family might move in with my parents while if I was in school. To make sure my wife has help and support. And allow us to sell our house and save a bunch of money during flight school. 

But we are struggling with that time apart too. It'll be rough, but we are leaning towards managing it apart. 

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8 hours ago, Twadd said:

My wife and I are trying to plan this right now if I'm picked up on Jan board. 

I'm AD AF stationed 3 hours away from rucker, where wife is settled and 3 kids are in school. But my parents live 5 hours from rucker, so the family might move in with my parents while if I was in school. To make sure my wife has help and support. And allow us to sell our house and save a bunch of money during flight school. 

But we are struggling with that time apart too. It'll be rough, but we are leaning towards managing it apart. 

If you’re going to sell the house and move the family why not have them move to Rucker with you? You’ll be paying for a house while you’re there anyway, might as well have your family with you for the 1.5-2 years spent in training. 

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12 hours ago, Thedude said:

If you’re going to sell the house and move the family why not have them move to Rucker with you? You’ll be paying for a house while you’re there anyway, might as well have your family with you for the 1.5-2 years spent in training. 

I was thinking the same thing. You're only saving 500ish bucks a month with then living with your parents. You still have to pay for a place to live here and the cheapest you'll find is on base at Allen heights with a roommate. Or live in bowden and pay full bah for a nice house with the fam. You'll have plenty of time off to help with the kids trust me. I have more time off here than I have during my ten years in. It's honestly a really chill life in school. 

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9 hours ago, GM1 said:

I was thinking the same thing. You're only saving 500ish bucks a month with then living with your parents. You still have to pay for a place to live here and the cheapest you'll find is on base at Allen heights with a roommate. Or live in bowden and pay full bah for a nice house with the fam. You'll have plenty of time off to help with the kids trust me. I have more time off here than I have during my ten years in. It's honestly a really chill life in school. 

 

22 hours ago, Thedude said:

If you’re going to sell the house and move the family why not have them move to Rucker with you? You’ll be paying for a house while you’re there anyway, might as well have your family with you for the 1.5-2 years spent in training. 

I guess I can see these sides of it too. Do you all have families there at rucker with you? Do you feel you have enough time to balance studying with family? We've got 3 kids, and 5 dogs so it's quite a circus at times. 

I found time to finish my BA all online, so I'm sure I could probably balance flight school too. 

The plan was going to be to leave them in the house we own now, just to let the kids stay in the same schools, but then my wife wouldn't really have support here. My parents offered to let them move with them to give my wife support/let us save money and attack her student loans. And hopefully come out of flight school debt free and with a house down-payment. 

But also 1.5-2 years of driving up on weekends and time apart isn't ideal either. 

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I haven't been in flight school for a long time now but I did it with my wife there with me. With one exception (and he ended up divorced) everyone else I went with that was married with kids had their family with them. You will still spend 12 hours a day at your house and every weekend for a year plus. Additionally, you won't likely won't save much money because you will still be paying for a house/apartment for you to live in at Rucker. Factor the $2-300 in gas spent making multiple ten hour roundtrip drives each month to see your family and it just seems like a lot of hardship for very little gain. 

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I was in same boat brother. I'm coming from Bragg and own my place there. Our initial plan was to leave them at Bragg and I'll just do the Rucker thing myself.

The issue is I probably wouldn't get any barracks/on-base housing without having to sacrifice BAH. The big thing for me was I have a 3 year old and a 7 month old and that kinda sealed the deal. I don't want to be gone from them for a year when that's going to happen for deployments anyway. We ended up renting our place out at Bragg, and secured Off-post Housing at Rucker. It should be nice. :)

My recommendation is if you own property, do the work and rent it (great market for it right now) and have them come with you to give you a support system; then choose if you want to live on or off post. Good luck fam!

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