What's it like to be in the army with Asperger's?

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Hey, I'm thinking about being a doctor in the army, but it sounds like a big part of being in the army is having friends. The structure of the army sounds nice, the rules and routine, but it's a lot to go through and you need people to lean on right? So, was anyone here in the army and if you were, did you make friends and what was the experience like?

I was an enlisted solider in the US Army.

I was assigned to a medical unit where new doctors and dentists were assigned.

The Army has a "fraternization policy", so you are somewhat restricted in your friendships.
https://www.thebalance.com/army-fratern ... cy-3344585

Likely, you will have no friendships with enlisted soldiers or junior officers, because, you have "rank over them".

I saw the medical officers stick with other medical officers.

One interesting thing they told me, as part of their officer training, they have "open bathrooms" where males and females use the bathroom together, facing each other, with no dividers.

I was in the Navy way back in the '70s, and the overall structure, rules, routine and such were fine for me. I had no problem with friendly people as "friends", but I only ever saw them while on duty. If I were in your place, I would be asking the recruiter a lot of questions to make certain of being able to get into the kind of work you actually want to do: Search Medical Corps Careers & Jobs.

If you have a diagnosis then it is very unlikely they will let you in

They might change their minds should a Vietnam-type situation occur.

In World War II, especially after about 1943 or so, 45-year-olds were drafted. Even people with "flat feet," previous rated an automatic 4F, now became draftable. You can also feign gayness and be declared 4F.

Now, you can't be over about 33 years of age if you're volunteering for the Army for the first time.

Modern military doesn't need bodies, they won't take us because they don't want to be stuck paying the bill for our healthcare for the rest of our lives. In 2017 the military is one of the few blue collar careers left so they don't have any trouble finding new recruits.

viewtopic.php?t=341090

Nav_Aspie has written some nice info on enlisting with AS in this thread

As a doctor and officer it might be ok. I was an elisted soldier in the infantry and it was not a very good fit.

I lacked the ability of protective lying and I spoke my mind because I knew that none of the people there were any smarter or knowledgable than I.

This got me in to trouble. When I saw something that was bullsh@t, I said so, but I never made it any higher than corporal, so those that were responsible for the BS and outranked my, would take revenge for me for my honesty.

As I said, if you are a doctor and an officer, it might work, because you will not be a command officer and are there for your special skills.

If I ever joined the military, I'd be a military hairdresser.

Protecting our men and women from getting hair in their eyes, one shave at a time.

I'd also demand respect for serving for my country.

But seriously, most of the military nowadays is boring 9-5 desk jobs on the base.

joining the military was #1 on my list of things NEVER to do. I had no business being in anybody's army, but in june of '84, there I was - as lennon said, "life is what happens when you've made other plans." I can tell you that during Ronnie Raygun's first term there was a BIG ramp-up of military personnel not so different from what happens at the outset of a war, it was during a major recession so there were lotsa folk just wanting 3 hots and a cot to get off the street. I was one of them. I was an addled recruit mixed in with some even more addled/sociopathic recruits, and since I did my best to keep my nose clean and obey orders, the brassholes' attention was able to be [mostly] distracted by the outright phuqups and downright insubordinate crooks/thugs I shared a open-bay barracks with. IOW I should never have passed basic and advanced training but was ignored because many of the other recruits who would do things like assault drill sergeants and punch officers in the mouth. I was too afraid of those brassholes [a brutal bunch] to even think of stuff like that.
anyways.... enough of the nasties managed to follow the rules sufficient to be elevated to leadership positions, at least as non-commissioned officers or sergeants. I lacked leadership traits/talents [aggression and guile], so I never made it past the rank of specialist 4, AKA "glorified private." an indian and not a chief. the army then and now vastly prefers chiefs, and they have something called "Qualitative Management Program" to filter out as many Indians as possible, retaining only chiefs, IOW if you have not got any NCO stripes by the end of your first enlistment, out you go.
this aspie barely managed to tolerate the requirements, such as being able to march [never could do that, so I spent lotsa time in KP washing utensils and trays], fitting properly in uniforms [odd-shaped body], avoiding heatstroke in the winter-issue Battle Dress Uniforms we were issued and had to wear in the hot texas sun [failed that one also], stiff and suffocating dense weave cloth designed to hide a soldier's heat signature from enemy IR scanning, as it was explained to me then. having to wear a goddarned thick t-shirt [under BDUs] and hat ALWAYS. always sweating and getting yelled at for sweating. having to live in noisy open-bay barracks filled with a bunch of rowdies and their barbaric YAWPs. being treated as a non-person. standing in formation under the hot sun, a bee lands on your nose and you wince and get yelled at for wincing. having to stand at parade rest for way too long. parade rest is an awkward military formation body posture where your arms are cruelly bent 90 degrees and interlocked behind your back. very uncomfortable. having brassholes screaming in your face and the spittle getting in your eye and you cannot deviate from the position of attention [ramrod straight, eyes straight ahead, arms locked at sides] OR ELSE. having to do endless pushups past the point of exhaustion. endless head games. always having to watch one's back around a bunch of backstabbing scheming fellow inmates trying to push you down to push themselves up. being called "private ret*d" more times than I could count. I gather than one would have to be a much better aspie than this aspie, to find such conditions congenial or even tolerable. and this was just in basic/AIT, permanent party [first duty station after training] was its own kind of nasty. my permanent duty station was also an officer basic course station, and their training was far milder, they called it "holiday inn." no yelling/pushups, just classroom work and field work. so if a prospective aspie can hide his/her aspieness well enough, that might work. in retrospect, I saw that there were aspie-ish people in the army with me back in the day, only the vocabulary to describe them was not there in common usage. they were generally in the higher ranks, the ones like me usually got filtered out at the recruiter's office. the smarter ones with college went to OBC and got their commissions.

People with a formal diagnosis and that have had any form of accomodations after age 14 are not welcomed. If anybody would like a copy of the DoD documentation that states this private message me and I will send you a copy. Kind regards. Shark