To want to hear from him in the military

[Floopyandtired]

I’ve been seeing a new guy for 4-5 months and 5 weeks ago he begun army basic training. We’re not “official” as we’ve both recently come out of serious relationships and there’s DC’s involved so we want to take it slow, but that’s where it’s heading.

Since he’s left for basic training though I’ve heard nothing from him apart from 1 message saying “thank you” when I said I hoped it was going well. I’ve sent him the odd message, about one a week, just keeping him in the loop with what’s going on and he’s read them all but not replied. I’ve decided to just leave it for now and assume I’ll hear from him when he’s ready.

I have no experience of the forces at all so I don’t know if I’m BU to expect to hear from him during this time? I can’t imagine how full on it must be for him so am trying not to over think and be selfish about the situation.

DH says each intake will be slightly different- his troop (and this was eleven years ago) were allowed their phones but he knew others that only got an hour a night. Also most of the camps are very rural in areas with poor signal generally, and often the buildings they're in are effectively "bomb proof" with even worse signal inside. The last thing he might want to do after getting up at 5am and being crazy busy all day is go outside for a phone call or to send a text- but that being said, DH does it without fail. If he has battery on his phone and can get signal I will hear from him, even on exercise.

I'm very happy with DH but it's difficult at times- it's an inflexible organisation (duh!) and they haven't moved with the times, which is partly why retention rates are so poor at the moment. I can only imagine how hard it would be with your own kids to think about as well, you can't just follow him and his postings like I theoretically could, or organise your plans around last minute guard duties, exercises or leave bans. This is unfortunately a sign of things to come.

Just as a word of warning I think you need to manage your expectations carefully as personality changes are rife with basics, especially if he's coming to it from a slightly older age. I've seen many really revert back to their lad days going to basics, being around a young group of lads, bonding, going out. It's early days in the relationship so I just would be a bit guarded. As you've seen it's all a bit different as to how much access they get to their phone, but by week 5 in the two services DH joined he had regular access by then, if you're seeing he's on WhatsApp I wouldn't try and make too many excuses for him. Maybe just keep things cool and catch up with him when he's next home to evaluate how you're both feeling.

11 years since now DH did it but he had to write several letters a week home (as in fountain pen and writing paper). I'm pretty sure we had phone contact, but intermittent. They were on the go from 6am to late evening first few weeks.

Long distance relationships are hard work, esp military ones where contact can vary greatly. It's got better in recent years with new technology bit that in a way makes it harder as we are used to people being contactable 24/7

Yes I’m afraid YABU.
I’m a military wife, and ex-serving myself.
My DH has been away on a training exercise for 2 weeks and I’ve spoken to him once. Eldest DC crying at bedtime every night because she wants daddy, not me. And this is only 2 weeks! It can be anything up to 6/7 months. Back in the early days of Afghanistan, when they had no internet, no landlines, a really slow mail service and only ancient satellite phones to call home on we could go weeks on end without speaking, absolutely shitting myself every time someone knocked on my front door when I hadn’t heard from him.

As horrible as it is at times, he’s a soldier first. The military practically own him and his time I’m afraid. And if he’s still within his first 6 weeks, it’s highly likely that he doesn’t have open access to his phone yet. When I was in basic training, we had our phones taken off us the moment we arrived and they were locked away in the platoon office except for 20 mins every other evening when we were allowed a single phone call - mostly to our parents! Things were slightly more relaxed after the first 6 weeks, which is all about “the shock of capture” - they have to break you down to knock the civilian out of you so they can then build you back up as a soldier.
But as others have said, if he’s seen messages and hasn’t even acknowledged them with a quick “sorry can’t talk right now!”, then it does maybe sound a bit like he’s mugging you off