Joint Military Couple

GoNavy4321

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Does anyone have any advice on how joint military couples would work with an Air Force & Navy couple? I've been dating someone who is going into the AF as an officer, and I will be commissioning as a Naval Officer. We've been together for awhile but have been struggling with the reality of how things will work out in the coming future.
 
On the personal front, clear two-way communications about assumptions, expectations, family plans, personal financial goals and responsibilities, career aspirations, further education, areas of compromise and many other non-glowing-sunset-beach-walk-romantic topics, are critical to the survival of the relationship. These are the areas where couples often founder. Compromise and acceptance are critical, so that the unresolved issue doesn’t seep back to poison the relationship.

On the professional front, with the same Service, the usual policy is to “do their best to support co-location of dual military couples,” which could mean duty stations in the same state or on the same coast, but make no promises. Sometimes the choice is “sure, we can give you orders to where he/she is, but that will be a lateral step in your career, as we don’t have a X career milestone billet available there for you, but we do have one in (opposite coast).” No promises for unmarried couples.

As for inter-service dual military, you will have to compare your career paths and milestones, look for areas with joint bases, determine when you can handle tours apart, or is one of you going to be primary and the other a “follower.”

It can be done. Most military women marry military people. DH and I were both Navy, and spent several tours apart, but it just made us stronger together. All of our disagreements related to the items I named above, which we had to work though. Any couple can tell you assumptions and expectations can widely differ between two people

Final bit of advice. If someone bites off a “Fine, it’s fine,” to end a conversation, it is probably not.
 
On the personal front, clear two-way communications about assumptions, expectations, family plans, personal financial goals and responsibilities, career aspirations, further education, areas of compromise and many other non-glowing-sunset-beach-walk-romantic topics, are critical to the survival of the relationship. These are the areas where couples often founder. Compromise and acceptance are critical, so that the unresolved issue doesn’t seep back to poison the relationship.

On the professional front, with the same Service, the usual policy is to “do their best to support co-location of dual military couples,” which could mean duty stations in the same state or on the same coast, but make no promises. Sometimes the choice is “sure, we can give you orders to where he/she is, but that will be a lateral step in your career, as we don’t have a X career milestone billet available there for you, but we do have one in (opposite coast).” No promises for unmarried couples.

As for inter-service dual military, you will have to compare your career paths and milestones, look for areas with joint bases, determine when you can handle tours apart, or is one of you going to be primary and the other a “follower.”

It can be done. Most military women marry military people. DH and I were both Navy, and spent several tours apart, but it just made us stronger together. All of our disagreements related to the items I named above, which we had to work though. Any couple can tell you assumptions and expectations can widely differ between two people

Final bit of advice. If someone bites off a “Fine, it’s fine,” to end a conversation, it is probably not.
I really like this response. I understand it's something that takes patience and work - we've been doing long distance as college students on opposite ends of the country. There are so many unknowns going forward that I don't know how to approach. i.e should we get married as soon as we commission to try and get as close to each other as possible? Should one of us forgo our career after 5 years? Should starting a family come after we settle? The biggest concern I have is the fact that we are both in different services, but as you mentioned, the only difference seems to be that selecting bases in near proximity is a struggle..

Im not sure if you ran into some of these same concerns, but I hope you can empathize with what I'm thinking.

I appreciate you taking the time to offer me your advice.
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Dual military couple is not easy. It can be done, but there are hurdles.
Being different services will present different issues. If you’re the same service you can at least try to get based together, an option for married personnel. Possible for different services but that much harder. If you’re serious, one of you should look into an inter service transfer. I’ve known a few couples who met during SA exchange programs and did this. One of the couple did a cross commission in each case.
DW and I were a joint couple. We met as LTs during our first assignments in Korea.
As with MJ, we spent time apart until our careers lined up. I think 2 of our first 3 years of marriage were apart. Even dating, at one point she was in SC, I was based in AL. For one year I was in the Sahara Desert, she was in Korea. Communication was written letters and the occasional MARS ham radio DSN phone patch to a common phone in her BOQ hall way until she got her own phone. Tough to explain.
At some point since we wanted kids we started honestly evaluating our careers. We had a choice- have someone else raise our kids or one of us put our career on the back burner. We came to this realization when I called home from a short trip to Central America and some friends answered the phone. They weren’t just visiting, they were there to pick up our 4 month old daughter as my DW was just sent to Kuwait indefinitely on short notice. We had a plan, but it still broke my DWs heart to leave her infant daughter. Our friends watched our DD until I came home.
We both took a step back. I realized that as an O-4 I had reached my maximum level of incompetence while my DW still had much to achieve. So I left active duty to take care of the kids and support her career. Even then there was juggling. Like when I was called back to active duty and sent overseas for a year while she was in school. Or when she was deployed and the kids were in high school. But while it wasn’t an easy road I would not give up the life we have had and the kids we raised for anything. No regrets.
For us this was the correct decision. DW is still active duty and we are still married after 30 years. Kids did ok- DD and DS are at SAs.
I would like to give you a magic answer, but there isn’t one. Every person must walk their own path. As you can see from the answers given there are a number of paths down this road. What worked for us may not for you. Good luck.
 
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Both of you need to research your Service co-location policies. As @UHBlackhawk pointed out, every couple, every relationship, every set of choices can vary.

I personally would counsel against getting married right after commissioning. You will be very busy learning how to be a JO, you will hit another maturation stage of personal growth and development out in the real world, there will be new life challenges to master and yes, you both will change in ways you don’t see coming. You’ve been managing a distance relationship so far. Set yourself a time period after commissioning to see how you handle being newly launched adults. It is a very different thing to work on the daily maintenance of a marriage along with all the other new challenges that will hit. You also have no way of knowing what your lives will look like a year from now or 5 years from now. Life has a way of happening, in unexpected ways. You also don’t have to solve it all today; there is some element of having loosely-agreed upon plans and being adaptable.
 
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I can't imagine the challenges an AF & Navy couple will face. There are VERY FEW "joint" locations. The challenges will be immense.

Off the top of my head: Hawaii (Hickam-Pearl), Okinawa (Kinda), Langley/Norfolk, Sodom-on-Potomac (later in career)...

I have no doubt it can be done...but it will be a challenge.

Steve
(dual-military spouse once upon a time when less than 600 miles apart was joint)
 
I'll throw in another view point. While certainly joint military couples face many challenges being co-located, being married to a civilian can also face some of the same challenges. Being a military spouse for more than 20 years, I decided to give up my career because it was difficult to frequently move and still be able to advance in my career. Ultimately, we decided as a couple that it made more sense for my spouse to stay in the military and for me to stay home with the kids. Certainly, many spouses have chosen to continue with their career. However, that has also led to couples still not living in the same area because the spouse chose not to move with the military spouse due to their career. While we have seen this work for some couples, we've seen many more that were not able to overcome these hurdles. I think the only difference is the civilian spouse has more of a choice than a military spouse that still owes time. It ultimately is going to come down to priorities. I just thought that I would throw it out there that whether you ultimately decided to marry another person in the military or a civilian, there will be always be unique challenges in a military marriage that civilians will not face. I too agree with what Capt MJ stated above.
 
Not that its the same but there is a girl (lady) on Youtube in her late 20s. She is AF enlisted and she married a guy who is a Marine. They both went to their respective commands and requested to be stationed together or nearby. The Marines said no but the AF worked with her. She will be moving to another AF base near her husband Marine base. They are going to get a place in the middle, between the AF and Marine base. Each one will have somewhere between 30-45 minute drive every day. She also wound up applying and being accepted to Space Force (or whatever its called) However, they couldnt promise her she woudl be able to stay in that same new base so she didnt accept. My point, is they some branches will try to work with you. My sons best friend who is also AF, married his girlfriend who is also in the AF (medical) earlier than planned so that they could live in the same state. There bases are about 1 hour away from each other so while he has a longer drive than her, it all worked out. Of course he is now being sent to Kuwait for a while
 
I can't imagine the challenges an AF & Navy couple will face. There are VERY FEW "joint" locations. The challenges will be immense.

Off the top of my head: Hawaii (Hickam-Pearl), Okinawa (Kinda), Langley/Norfolk, Sodom-on-Potomac (later in career)...

I have no doubt it can be done...but it will be a challenge.

Steve
(dual-military spouse once upon a time when less than 600 miles apart was joint)
You can add in US Southern Command and probably a JIATF. My EX spouse and I were joint duty in the same service. It was extremely difficult with months spent apart on multiple occasions. Short tours, TDYs, training, etc.

Trying to make joint duty work across services just adds another layer of complexity.

I'd advise to go in with your eyes open IF you do get married. Realize you will be separated for 6+ months at a time and Joint may be locations within a couple hundred miles.

Best of luck to you and God Bless.
 
If two active-duty military members get married, they will get a subsidy for the Basic Allowance for Housing. BAH only works when they are not staying in government-funded housing and serving permanent active duty within the country.
 
Off the top of my head: Hawaii (Hickam-Pearl), Okinawa (Kinda), Langley/Norfolk, Sodom-on-Potomac (later in career)...
On top of that, just because it's there's a Navy base doesn't mean you'll be stationed there. Depends on the community.

For example, Okinawa is ESG staff, maybe a handful of NGLO billets, and I think 1-2 liaison officers with III MEF, and some MPRA. So if you're not a SWO or a P-8 pilot/NFO, you're probably not going to be stationed there. (Though if you like Japan, Yokota-Yokosuka is very doable).

There are folks that make a longer distance than the notional co-lo radius (90 miles) work. That might have to happen.

Consider that requesting co-location means (by the book) it becomes the highest priority for detailing. That may mean getting a "not great" job that isn't on the yellow brick road. It depends on the detailing process for the community and what their "business rules" look like for how formal that request can be and how much it can commit you to a set of orders.

I assumed you already read the MILPERSMAN, but if not: https://www.mynavyhr.navy.mil/Portals/55/Reference/MILPERSMAN/1000/1300Assignment/1300-1000.pdf

When you get there: Be transparent with your detailer, talk to mentors (preferably senior officers, O5/O6) about career risk, learn and follow the business rules the detailer sets. If they want a 12 month window to coordinate co-lo, don't call in at 6 months and expect things to move.

If two active-duty military members get married, they will get a subsidy for the Basic Allowance for Housing. BAH only works when they are not staying in government-funded housing and serving permanent active duty within the country.
It's normal single BAH, but both members will receive. The dependent rate is probably what you're thinking of. Married servicemembers cannot claim each other as dependents.
 
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My dh and I were a joint couple but AF and Army. Long story short, we only shared a residence for about 12 months total out of our first 5 years of marriage. That was very difficult on a young marriage. The Army did not work with us on joint assignments but the AF did a good job making up for it. The result of that was dh taking less than desirable jobs to get to a base I could ask for and me getting some weird but cool jobs close by. Being an Intel officer gave me a lot of flexability. We didn't stay in long enough to find out how that would affect our careers. While we did get stationed together twice, schools and deployments still kept up from being in the same location.

In the end, we both got out. Dh was dissatisfied with how his Army career was shaping up so he separated. Part of that was seeing the difference between his work-life and mine. I loved my job in the AF amd wanted to stay but couldn't reconcile having a family with my high and unpredictable deployment schedule so I separated a year later. Neither one of us anticipated our paths when we were dating and got married but that's how life goes.

I think being stationed together would be really hard with an AF-Navy marriage but as long as you go in understanding what you are getting into and prioritizing appropriately, it will be fine.
 
How about AF officer and enlisted marine? Any chance these two very different jobs can be stationed together? Have a daughter at USAFA and potential future son in law at Parris Island. I warned them :cool:
 
How about AF officer and enlisted marine? Any chance these two very different jobs can be stationed together? Have a daughter at USAFA and potential future son in law at Parris Island. I warned them :cool:
Officer/CDT/MIDN and enlisted relationships are prohibited by the UCMJ and service/Academy regulations. In a sentence, it undermines good order and discipline.

A common exception you will see, however, is when an enlisted couple has a prior-existing marriage and one gets picked up for a commissioning program. The couple will still be expected to observe enlisted/officer customs and courtesy while at work.
 
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