My name is Chelsea and my husband is a KC-135 pilot out of Selfridge ANGB. Our guard assignment started like many others where my husband had to do boards and get hired in. Luckily for us he was hired in our home state, but this was just the beginning to get us back home to his unit.
TRAINING
Before your spouse settles into their guard unit they will go through about 2 years training. Waiting for dates to begin the process was probably the hardest part. My husband was given dates for one part of training at a time, which if you are a planner can be very testing. If your spouse is not an officer their first step will be to go to Officer Training school for 2 months, Pilot Training for about a year, pilot initial qualification training (PIQ) in Altus, OK about 6 months, survival training (SERE), and back to their unit for Seasoning Days.
Even when your husband goes to the middle of nowhere for training I highly recommend going with them. We have met friends for life and were surrounded by people going through the same thing, which gave support for my husband and myself. Take this time to spend together because when they get back to their unit they are going to being flying as much as they can.
TEMPO, DEPLOYMENTS AND TDYS
Being the new pilot in his unit and wanting to gain as much flying time as possible he signs up for as many trips as he can. They have a super high tech and fancy system to assign pilots their trips…jk it’s a whiteboard.
Their TDYs/trips/deployments are a mixture of sunshine and beaches or deserts. With the guard each unit has their typical places they deploy to. With his unit his deployments consist of places like Guam or the Middle East. But he has had the opportunity to fly to Hawaii, the Virgin Islands and many states throughout the U.S. As a rule of thumb with their trips just plan on your spouses plane breaking at some point and them day drinking while you are shoveling snow, going to work, or holding down the house back home. Having a husband that gets to explore the world is both a blessing and a curse. With those trips though it gives us the opportunity to join them if both your schedules allow it. The amount of time your significant other spends away varies but typically my husband is gone once a month or every other month for work anywhere from 2 nights to 2 weeks (aside for when they deploy).
Being a guard spouse to a pilot can look different for many S.O. Being on guard duty is not a full-time job so our pilots seek full-time opportunities either civilian or military. This is just a short depiction of the experience I have had being married to someone in the guard.
MEET CHELSEA
