MEPS

This is my MEPS experience:

As i had mentioned previously i went to MEPS for my asvab almost 2 weeks ago and i went again yesterday.

On Sunday i showed up to the marriot hotel; 1 because it was free and 2 because i didn't want to wake up at 3 am and make the 40 mins drive to MEPS.

At the hotel i was hoping to make some friends, but i was too shy to approach the table full of guys;

I figured id get a roommate and make friends with her.

At 7 pm no sign of roommate i went downstairs and ordered my food. 

I ordered chicken fingers with fries and a pepsi. 

A couple of minutes before the food was brought out, i saw 2 guys looking like they were lost. So i was like are you guys trying to order your food? and they weren't (they were actually looking for the big group of guys) so i was like i don't wanna eat alone and they joined me and i made friends with them.

One was a guy shipping out for the marines and the other guy was getting his physical done for the coast guard. I spent the remaining hours of our 10 pm curfew with them just talking and hanging out by the pool.

Our wake up call was at 4:30 am, i did my routine and i made it down stairs at like 5:10 and everyone was already down stairs. The coast guard guy loudly joked she's air force guys, everyone laughed.

It was pretty funny, we ate and made it to meps by like 5:50 (doors opened at 6)

They put us through the metal detector and we lined up to check in using that finger printing system; luckily i already knew the trick was and i was able to check in fast. We sat down and waited for a while until everyone got checked in. 

I was suffering for those poor people who were there for the first time and the finger print gave them just as much or more trouble than me.

They took us to the 2nd floor where all the medical stuff would be done and I'm just going to list the things that happened.

- We sat in a room with desks with our names in medical record papers.

-They called us one by one to be imputed into the computer.

A page from my paperwork was missing so i was sent down stairs, problem was i got lost and i couldn't open any door -_- until i found one and it led outside. 

So i took advantage of the opportunity and grabbed my jacket,phone and water bottle. I tried to come back in and i got yelled at apparently you're not supposed to leave the building for any reason. i really didn't mean to leave though.

-They signed my paper and sent me back up where they took my blood pressure.

-A doctor asked me a bunch of medical questions.

-I took the eye test and depth perception, apparently i have great vision at 17/15 and all this time  i thought 20/20 was the best. (i passed the depth perception btw) Its a weird test with like 4 rows of circles and you have to tell them which one stands out to you, in each row. My word of advice to anyone is to relax and if you feel overwhelmed close your eyes and look again. Oh i also made friends with the people at meps, the medical people at least they're the ones who can help you in case you're off by a little bit, lucky for me i was fine but being friendly with the guy who did my vision test put me at ease.

-I really had to pee so i told the lady and she let me do the pee test. Not as bad as i imagined it. Just a clean stall and you have to pee with the door open while a lady stands there. As bad as i had to pee i was freaking out and couldn't, i sat there for what seemed like the longest 5 mins. It was so frustrating because my bladder felt full but it wouldn't come out and the lady watching me (who was a the only rude person i encountered at meps this time) didn't make it any easier, i tried to make conversation so i could relax but she wouldn't respond. Finally she started talking to this guy and my pee came out hallelujah! i fucked up the labels they gave me because he said things too fast and i didn't wanna bother him with repetition.

-Went to get my blood taken out, the stupid veins wouldn't show. They stabbed both arms because the first one wasn't letting enough blood out. On a good note i didn't feel sick at all, because i didn't see my blood at all. 

-Hearing test was in a booth, you wear headphones and listen for the sound and click when you hear something. I personally closed my eyes to help me concentrate better.

-The physical test was in this cold ass room, we changed into hospital gowns and did some arm movements, touched our toes and he checked our spine. No duck walk for us and by us i mean 4 of us girls. Then you go one by one to this room and they check your boobs and quickly glance to make sure you're a girl that was so quick i didn't even have time to think about it. They also weighed us (i ended up being 116 pounds, 1 less than what the recruiter wanted me to be)  and took our height.

- You go up to the desk they send you to the doctor one more time for paperwork and you're back down stairs to the control desk, where they send you to your branches liaison.

-The sgt i got asked me to verify some paperwork and then gave me a list of jobs to chose from and told me to number them 1-9.

-I went to this other office where they input who i would leave my money to if something was to happen to me and such.

-You go back to your liaisons office and sign some paperwork then i went to this room where i watched a video on what happens if you do stupid things in the military and its consequences.

-Waited about an hour and got sworn in. Made friends with a guy who's parents were watching him get sworn in and got pictures taken :p

-Signed more papers, went back to the air force and i was officially in the DEP, Delayed entry program.

I gotta wait until a job i put down becomes available to get a ship date.

I went to my recruiters office today, got briefed on the DEP program and was made aware of how fortunate i was to be let back in after i went outside of the building for meps with my medical records thats a BIG NO NO! and they send people home immediately when they do that, no questions asked. I got really lucky. oh and i weighed in at 114 again today whoops LOL

Tears of happiness

I was scheduled to take my asvab today at 2.
My recruiter told me to come to his office at 9 am to sign some paperwork, because he was confident i would do well and he wanted me to go back to MEPS this friday.
I was so exhausted because i got home from work at 1 am and today was supposed to be my day off to sleep in! That didn't happen, i was up before 8 from the anticipation.
Im supposed to gain weight so i ate potatoes, ham and drank a shitload of water before i went to my recruiters office.
I weighed in at 116.8, 3 hours at the office and 2 trips to the bathroom and i was down to 115.8.
I went home went to the bathroom and i was on my way to MEPS about 2 hours before i was supposed to be there.

At 2 pm people started lining up to sign in and put the paper you get from your recruiter to request examination down on this black basket looking thing.
The finger print thing was a nightmare for me, it just wouldn't work for me and the guy at the desk was very mean about it. Call me stupid but this stupid arrow kept pointing to the upper left side, which i thought meant move my finger up and to the left, it also kept saying straighten your finger. I'm looking at the thing like wtf my finger can't get straighter than this! maybe my finger is nature crocked oh god!
The rude guy comes from behind the desk with all his frustration and turns my finger like the picture bellow. How does that make any sense? couldn't they have said put your finger diagonal?






How my finger was supposed to be ------>

Anyway after i left MEPS i pulled into another parking lot and called my recruiter to tell him my scores. I started freaking out because i saw a bunch of 50's and 60's so I'm like holy shit i failed.
He answered and i was like what am i looking for AFQT 80 i had passed and done better than 80% of the 20 year olds who took this. I shit you not i couldn't talk i was bawling, words cannot describe how happy i was. This is like a dream coming true, i studied so hard for this and i did it.

All i have to do is pass the physical on friday, which should be fine because i've never had any medical complications at all. thank god.

update

Not even a month later and I'm okay.
Time heals things and in the end it was the right thing to do, I'm happier now.

My precious green card finally arrived after 3 years of an emotions roller coaster wait.

Literally the day it arrived i emailed my local air force recruiter to set up an appointment and he set up an appointment for the following week.
I went to my appointment and since I'm not a citizen i don't qualify for more than 50 jobs and i think I'm exaggerating, there its probably less.
I don't care though. This is all i've ever wanted to do and the medical jobs don't require me to be a citizen so it works out for me, though it would be cool to do something with law enforcement but we'll see in the future.
Anyway i took the stupid practice asvab they give you at the recruiters office and i bombed it, scoring a 47 (better than the 39 i got when i was in high school haha)
The recruiter then told me about how i needed at least a 50 to enlist and that he recommended a 55 because if you flunk tech school for whatever reason, they'll give another shot at another job instead of just kicking you out.
Fair enough he told me to go home and study for 2 weeks so i did.
I studied so hard! focusing on math because thats my weakest area.
I texted my recruiter asking if i could come by after the 2 weeks had passed, he didn't reply but i showed up anyway and little did he know i would end up scoring a 73 this time around.
Now he was excited now he was going to take me seriously, because he would finally understand i want this really bad and I'm usually pretty good at getting what i want.
I was supposed to take the real asvab this past friday but his computer was failing and he was unable to schedule me.

EVERYTHING happens for a reason i was freaking out and i probably wouldn't have been as confident as i am now.
I bought the asvab cram plan on amazon. This book is great! though it only focuses on the AFQT subjects it does a great job at teaching you the basics. The best part is you learn and then do about 10 problems of practice to check your knowledge, which is what i love the most because its not just blah blah blah learn learn learn but to me practice makes me better.
We'll see how i do on the real thing though I'm almost halfway done with the book.
On monday ill give my recruiter a call to see when we can schedule my test for I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a 70 or above.



As for this website i found on many of my online practice asvab searches
 http://www.study-asvab.com/
Ive never been so disappointed i was looking for a site that would provide me which CAT-ASVAB like scenarios and at 39.99 i said what the heck it seems like a good deal and theres a 60 day money back guarantee so i have nothing to lose.
Nothing to lose my ass except for the 40 dollars i lost. Within minutes of being granted access with my purchase i see this is a scam, theres only 1 practice test and the "notes" are only 56 pages long with information i could have gotten off google dummed down! I email the company asking for a refund immediately and i still haven't gotten a reply. So I'm writing this to warn people because i looked for reviews before i made the purchase and i couldn't find any.
http://www.study-asvab.com/ ISNT WORTH 39.99
http://www.study-asvab.com/ ONLY HAS 1 CAT-ASVAB LIKE PRACTICE TEST
http://www.study-asvab.com/ DOESNT REPLY TO CUSTOMERS
http://www.study-asvab.com/ CONSUMER REVIEW

I hope my experience can save someone else those 39.99 because its not fair to scam people who's dreams depend on your product.

Whats your story?

I cant believe i haven't blogged since May?
I started going out with Matt aka porn star June 9th. I didn't think it would last but here i am still with him almost 5 months later. Life works in funny ways. He's actually an amazing boyfriend or shall i say girlfriend, because he's basically the girl in this relationship and maybe thats what i needed.

Now onto my story...
Pretty sure the reason i started this blog was so once i was almost able to tell my story, id be able to share it and maybe, just maybe somebody would be able to relate to me.

You should probably know I'm an immigrant, i arrived here when i was 12.
NOBODY comes to the U.S and magically becomes legal, but there are ways to do so later on.
So i came here as a tourist and we decided to stay. I have been legal since i got here but being legal isn't enough, you see the thing with immigration policies is they seem simple but they are far more complex than the naked eye can see. Long story short this psycho path tried to kill my mom and it turned out there was a Visa that covered victims of abuse for collaborating with justice and being brave enough to speak up. It's called a U visa, so if you're an immigrant and a victim of abuse don't let people threaten you or be afraid of speaking up, if things are legit they will work out to your advantage.

In 2006 my mom sent the paperwork to immigration...2009 came along and immigration "hadn't received" our paperwork. Hard lesson learned always send important stuff through certified mail.
A U visa requires you to be under it for 3 years before you can apply for a Greencard. After 3 years based on your behavior they decide whether your worthy enough or not (nobody wants to grant such privilege to a parasite) So since they lost our paperwork we had to start over again which meant 3 more years of waiting. During this 3 years you're provided a work permit and a social security card number which allows you to work, get a drivers license etc.
It wasn't until a month before i graduated in 2010 that i found out that i would not be able to attend college because the missing piece of my puzzle, in order to qualify for in state tuition you need  a Green card, which i could get for 2 more years.
About 8 college acceptance letters my dreams were crushed, put on hold for 2 years after i graduated.
Words cannot describe how painful it is to work your ass off in high school for 4 years and not be able to collect its perks. I was not going to be able to go to college just yet, while all my friends went on and set out to reach their dreams. I was bitter, i was mad upset because i had accomplished so much for "nothing" as i used to say. I was so bothered by the lack of motivation the other kids displayed when they had so many possibilities! You can go to college, you can travel why aren't you doing something with your life other than getting pregnant, going to parties or doing drugs. I thought all of that was ridiculous! I really hated it/ hate it when people ask me if i go to school, when you say "no" you get the craziest look from people like what are you doing with your life if you aren't going to school? I was working my ass off to buy my car. Since i wanted to join the military, i told people i wasn't going to school because i was enlisting as soon as i felt ready to take the ASVAB again. That was a white lie because i am enlisting but the reason i haven't enlisted isn't because I'm waiting to feel ready, though i was not satisfied with my first ASVAB score but that is expired by now since i took it my junior year.
Anyway that story gets kinda old after almost 3 years, i know a lot of people don't take that answer seriously but sooner or later ill be able to show them.
I actually thought sooner would be this past monday when my mom went to pick up "our" green cards from the lawyers office, i was so excited the time was finally here! I imagined countless scenarios with an air force recruiter. I was going to walk in an let them know i was finally ready to cross into the blue, like the invitation i was sent after i took my ASVAB my junior year,which i still keep in my memory folder.
So that monday morning my mom had everyones green card except for mine...why me? me who's been waiting for 2 years to make something happen, me who had all the desire in the world to go see a recruiter that afternoon, me who finally wants to make a something happen!
Turns out they couldn't process my paperwork because they were missing the last 2 copies of my passport pages and that they wouldn't do anything until those were received. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? out of everyones paperwork why is mine missing pages when everything was sent through certified mail?
That same day my mom copied my whole passport in color and sent it in. Wednesday i got a text alert from immigration saying they had received my paperwork and that it could take up to 60 days for a review. Here we go again the waiting game, my mom thinks it shouldn't take that long but last time when i got that alert it did take almost 2 months... sigh.
Don't get me wrong i am so grateful for having this opportunity even if its taking forever.
I know there are kids out there who are waiting for nothing, because they don't have a something to wait for or a work permit to allow them to kill time, while they wait for that nothing that has no estimate as to when it will come; there are others who have everything, yet they don't take advantage of any it.
So I'm just here waiting for my something.