Army cook wants to stay home & be a mom.

[facattack]

Story on Yahoo. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ap_on_re_us/us_soldier_mom_deployment) She's concerned that her kid would be given up for a foster home without her and her mother isn't capable of taking care of a child as well as the other thing she does.

[barythrin]

That'll be a lot of latrine duty in her passing time. Honestly not sure how I feel bout that. I see both sides of the argument, 1. she had the kid while in the army so that was irresponsible and not well planned, 2. she had things in correct order on paper and knew she was to be deployed however the mental status of the legal guardian changed so that's the problem she's trying to get around which is unusual but happens.

Still, her life will suck for a while on base while it gets sorted through. Hopefully she'll get someone able to watch the kid and get to serve as she signed up for. It'd be ashame and probably abused further (by others) if she gets out and just gets army benefits without risk or follow through of assignment.

Usually you'd get dishonorably discharged and end of story.

[IBMMuseum]

The forum subcategory for political posts has been discussed in the past, and generally I prefer a focused forum, but here goes:

I had actually seen the article before you brought it up here. The article does cover the procedures in place for single parents (or parents that are both in the military and deployable) quite well. She had her "Family Readiness Plan" in order, but the caretaker (her mother) backed out right as she went to deploy.

It happens...

A servicemember's ability to deploy depends on their family's readiness (in this case, it also means her mother's). Later statements that she would not deploy actually are correct, until she finds a new caretaker for her baby. Probably she is being disciplined for failure to communicate properly with her command, as the Army deals with the Family Readiness Plan troubles on a regular basis.

For those that are judgemental on her decision, imagine being a mother, and away from your baby for a year or longer (Army deployments are at least that long, "in-country"). A woman (also a single mother) that was deployed with me (in 2003 - 2004, for the Army) was away from her baby for 15 months. It was of course very hard on her.

I had a similiar situation of my own. In 2005 I married overseas. March of 2006, after I had submitted immigration paperwork for my wife and stepchildren, I was notified I would deploy for a fifth time to the Middle East region. When informed of this in the same month, the U.S. Consulate would not interview us quicker so I could get my family legally admitted to the United States before I deployed.

Our first petition for K-3/K-4 visas (spouse of U.S. citizen/stepchild(ren) of U.S. citizen) was denied on a technicality, despite having details about my deployment in hopes to expedite the process. The second petition (more money and a waiting period) was able to be approved and interviewed for, and we moved our family to the U.S. in July of 2007. My wife and stepchildren were still in their K "non-immigrant" statuses at that point (if I were killed overseas, with that status my family would lose their "qualifying relative" and be immediately removable from the U.S.), so I didn't mobilize with my unit in October of that year.

My family wasn't ready for me to deploy, so I wasn't ready...

It was January of 2008 before my family had Legal Permanent Resident status, when members of my unit were already in-country on their deployment...

I put in my retirement paperwork to end my military career instead...

Because I still can't understand when I am asked to go fight a war somewhere else, with a system that can't operate in a timely manner to get my family here...

But there are many in the U.S. that still don't think our immigration system needs reform...