this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2024
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askchapo
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Joined the military when I was kicked out of the house, all of the adults in my life told me it would be the best thing for me and set me up for life. So I bought into that stuff and was really excited about continuing my family legacy and becoming a man in my families eyes.
Well, I no longer talk to any of the adults in my life and I’m a non-binary trans communist. Biggest fucking regret and mistake of my life, but also I don’t know that I would have radicalized without seeing the belly of the beast and being a cog in the us navy, but I would like to give myself more grace than that.
My kid is still in great lakes. Just went thru boot. I'm scared shitless for them, thank you for the ray of hope. :)
If you can, try and stay in contact with them, I went really insular and lost that outlet and spent several years being kicked from navy psych to psych and hearing various forms of “shape up or get out.” When I met my now wife I had someone to talk to that was unconditionally supportive and they pointed out to me how being in the Navy was exactly like being in an abusive relationship, which help me reframe my issues as not really about myself, but about how I don’t fit into the system. The Navy wants you to internalize why you don’t fit in so that you’ll homogenize, and so that they don’t have to make structural changes. It’s really hard to feel like the odd one out in those places without an unconditional support system, the Navy certainly doesn’t provide that.
I was heartbroken as they didn't even tell me until they were leaving. I want to think I'm being supportive. But they obviously didn't think I would support their decision to join the Navy. Which is very true. I very much took a step back and got pissed but after processing that I realized I had to swallow my hurt and just support them. Otherwise I would just keep pushing them away.