Would I be unreasonable asking my partner to decline promotion now? Military & new baby on the way

[PockerMaus]

How would you feel in this situation?

For context.. my partner is 13 years into the military. We have an 11 month old son and are due our second in November 4th. A year before our son was born he moved to a really steady unit that works 9-5 and doesn't deploy. He chose this unit as it meant we had a bit more stability after a rough few years.

He didn't come off the board this year for promotion however he has since been offered a promotion from the reserve list so he hasn't got a choice on where to go. The unit he's been offered is a very busy and active unit and known as being one of the busiest units in terms of exercises & deployments.

He is keen to take the role as it means getting the promotion however I feel really nervous as we are due a new baby. I don't know what it will be like having two young children. I'll be on mat leave for 9 months but then I will return to my job as a firefighter and be on night shifts 2 x a week where he obviously looks after our son. I also worry as we have a good childcare plan where we do about 50% of the nursery pick ups/drop offs each to fit around our schedules.

We have discussed this between us and my partner understands where I'm coming from but I can tell he is still keen to take the role. He's going to find out tomorrow what the upcoming year looks like and how busy/deployable it will be.

Am I unreasonable for not wanting him to promote this time? I said it feels like the wrong time for it and could he not decline this job and then when promotions next come around he will have more choice on where to go.

What would you do in this situation? I do find the army a bit outdated in how it often feels like soldier first family second which doesn't really fit with how the world is these days.

Defence of the nation innit?!?😉

it was my life growing up so my “normal”, and went to boarding school for secondary for educational stability. I haven’t really thought through the “why” - I suspect it’s as much about career development and specialisation requiring filling certain roles as about making sure the numbers of bodies in any particular location are sufficient to meet current defence requirements ?

I don’t know where on earth you’re getting the idea that the RAF has fewer deployable roles, the women I’m talking about are in my husband’s trade and he deploys every 12-18 months.

My point is that it’s generally easier for women to get flexible dispensation in ANY sector, it’s a cultural thing, and it is no different in the military, it is in my opinion exacerbated in the military because it’s generally 10-20 years behind most other employers culturally (I have pulled that figure from my arse! But you have to remember you still have people in senior positions who’ve lived the service before self, trailing spouse, single income lifestyle that was still very prominent 90s-00s)

The military IS changing, albeit slowly, and the OP is absolutely right to challenge it within her relationship.

They are OP. There are schemes the one I mentioned that stops you deploying, and another one that stops you posting, I’ve forgotten what they’re called. We looked into the latter. The downside though is I suspect they stall progression (probably not officially! But culturally) get your partner to find out about them and include it in your discussions.

Interesting!! The cynical side of me wonders if my partner avoids looking into these due to potential progression stall.... Hey ho, I'll bring it up. And maybe do some of my own digging 😂👌🏼

Regardless of deployment and other issues, childcare is going to be an issue for the next 12+ years. The baby and pre-school years are actually easier in a way because you can find a reasonable range of childcare offerings from 8am to 6pm, 360-ish days a year. Even overnight. Once they hit school age the default is about 8:30am to 3pm, breakfast and after school clubs are very limited, and there are 13 weeks of school holidays to cover. It gets pretty difficult to find somewhere to send an 8yo off to overnight, if not a relative or a long established childminder you've been using for years. If you both continue to work full time in not very flexible jobs and there are shift patterns and exercises and things to cover, you're going to need to give a lot of thought to the childcare solutions - which is both of your responsibility to plan for, not just you!