These questions are simply out of curiosity. What is the lifestyle like in the U.S. Navy SEAL community? How often are they home, and how long do they stay home? How often are they deployed, and how long are the deployments? How is the career progression for both an enlisted U.S. Navy SEAL and a U.S. Navy SEAL Officer? How hard is it to start a family, or find a spouse, while in the U.S. Navy SEALs? What is their family life like, if family life exists at all? Thank you very much.
I was in the Special Boat Unit, and in the final portion of our work-ups we were more-or-less partnered up with a SEAL platoon, which we then deployed with. Here are my observations on the lifestyle:
-In general, your training goes in phases: professional development (schools like HALO or other stuff), basic work-ups (getting all your general skills re-certified), interoperability (working with EOD/boat teams/big Navy/task group), then deployment. Pro-dev in theory is very light duty/hours unless you're going to a school. In practice though, pro-dev usually gets cut pretty short due to manning issues, so you'll deploy, have a bit of relaxation time, then go right into work-ups.
Work-ups vary as well, and you'll usually go in one to two week blocks. Some will be local and you'll be finished by 3pm, others are far away, long hours, or take place at night, which screws up your family life.
Interop is largely the same as basic work-ups. I was unmarried at the time, but I got the feeling from most of the people I worked with that although they loved their jobs (I mean really loved their jobs), it could be hard on the family being away so often--that is, the long/odd hours outnumbered the easy ones.
Deployment varies as well. I didn't deploy to a war zone, so I (and the SEAL platoon) basically deployed and lived in a hotel overseas. We were largely responsible for our own days, but the task unit scheduled us for exercises that might have long/odd hours again. Of course, there are always contingencies, so there were a few times when we thought we'd have a week of sitting by the beach and suddenly got a phone call that said "get to X right away, and do Y".
In general, I'd say the lifestyle is probably somewhat more time-intensive than being a Surface Warfare Officer, but a SEAL is probably in a better mood because there's much, MUCH less BS and so much of the stuff he does is cool. That said, the married SEALs and boat guys I worked with tended to have a tough time with marriage, or rather the wives/kids seemed to have a pretty tough time with how much time was spent away from home.
Despite that, I'd say it's EASY to start a family as a SEAL. They often hang out together, are loud, fun, ripped guys, so finding a date didn't seem to be a problem at all.
As an officer you'll typically serve a task unit job (boring) as an ENS/LTJG, then the 2nd in command of a seal platoon(LTJG), then command of a platoon as a LT. After that, as an officer, it seems to me you're sort of stuck in staff land...but at least you're still a SEAL.
From what I saw, as an enlisted SEAL you basically go through your deployments, getting cooler and better schools and experience, until your body gets broken and...you become an enlisted staff weenie.
DISCLAIMER: I want to make it clear that I wasn't a SEAL, I don't want to make it seem like I was a SEAL, and I would of course take the advice or observations of a SEAL over my own. I worked pretty closely with them though, so I think my observations are probably better than some guy whose claim to fame is watching _Tears of the Sun_ 30 times.