Boot Camp Mental Impact
Boot Camp’s Mental Impact
Going to Basic Military Training for the United States Air Force was a life changing experience. It started with the intense dramatic change in my personal lifestyle. From living comfortably at my parent’s house, eating whatever I want to eat and being able to visit with friends and family on my own time. To being stripped of my own name and identity, only to be referred to as “Trainee”, losing all of my luxuries and freedoms I once took for granted. However I was not in it alone. Forty-nine other trainees were a part of my flight. They were like family for those eight and a half painfully long weeks. We struggled day by day together working as a team to achieve our goal of graduating and becoming proud Airmen of …show more content…
Twenty five awkwardly long and silent minutes went by until the bus arrived at the front gates of the Air Base. I immediately noticed the Air Force motto that was placed prominently on a large sign that stood over the entry road. “Integrity first, Service before self, and Excellence in all we do!” At the time I did not know those words were going to impact the rest of my life. The bus finally came to a complete stop outside of a three story tall solid brick building. The bus doors opened up with a loud hiss from the hydraulic pressure being released. A man in full camouflaged uniform stormed up into the bus. He wore a black campaign hat like one that might be seen worn by state policemen. It was tilted down just enough on top of his face to cause a shadow that concealed his eyes. Without hesitation he began to shout “GET OFF MY BUS! MOVE, MOVE, MOVE!” Everyone instantly got up and forcefully pushed their way off the bus. The military training instructor (MTI) cursed and screamed at people who were not moving fast enough for his liking. We scrambled quickly to form four single file lines and faced the MTI. Then he ordered us to set our bags down at our sides. Some people shuffled …show more content…
with a piercing loud trumpet that echoed the song Reveille through the speakers that were set up throughout the dorms and the rest of the Air Base. Then not a moment later the MTI came bursting through the door screaming “GET UP” continuously and slamming doors along with beds and anything else he could make a lot of noise with. Initially I slept through most of the booming noise, until I heard a thundering loud crashing of metal and tile flooring right next to me. My eyes flashed open to see that the MTI had flipped a bed over that had a fellow trainee on it that was not moving fast enough. I swiftly jumped out of my bed as fast as though it were on fire. I rushed to get changed, shaved, and my teeth brushed, in the overly crowded latrine with only eight sinks and fifty of us that needed to use them. As a flight we all fell into a formation of four single file lines organized from shortest in the back and tallest in the front. Our MTI would then march us to the training pad for an intense early morning workout. We did many different forms of stretches and calisthenics then ended with a mile long run. After the strenuous workout we regrouped back into the formation and got marched back to the dorms. There we had twenty minutes to get showered, changed and our beds made then to be back down outside and into formation to get ready to fall in to the chow hall for breakfast. This was no easy task, because there were eight shower heads in the
Going to Basic Military Training for the United States Air Force was a life changing experience. It started with the intense dramatic change in my personal lifestyle. From living comfortably at my parent’s house, eating whatever I want to eat and being able to visit with friends and family on my own time. To being stripped of my own name and identity, only to be referred to as “Trainee”, losing all of my luxuries and freedoms I once took for granted. However I was not in it alone. Forty-nine other trainees were a part of my flight. They were like family for those eight and a half painfully long weeks. We struggled day by day together working as a team to achieve our goal of graduating and becoming proud Airmen of …show more content…
Twenty five awkwardly long and silent minutes went by until the bus arrived at the front gates of the Air Base. I immediately noticed the Air Force motto that was placed prominently on a large sign that stood over the entry road. “Integrity first, Service before self, and Excellence in all we do!” At the time I did not know those words were going to impact the rest of my life. The bus finally came to a complete stop outside of a three story tall solid brick building. The bus doors opened up with a loud hiss from the hydraulic pressure being released. A man in full camouflaged uniform stormed up into the bus. He wore a black campaign hat like one that might be seen worn by state policemen. It was tilted down just enough on top of his face to cause a shadow that concealed his eyes. Without hesitation he began to shout “GET OFF MY BUS! MOVE, MOVE, MOVE!” Everyone instantly got up and forcefully pushed their way off the bus. The military training instructor (MTI) cursed and screamed at people who were not moving fast enough for his liking. We scrambled quickly to form four single file lines and faced the MTI. Then he ordered us to set our bags down at our sides. Some people shuffled …show more content…
with a piercing loud trumpet that echoed the song Reveille through the speakers that were set up throughout the dorms and the rest of the Air Base. Then not a moment later the MTI came bursting through the door screaming “GET UP” continuously and slamming doors along with beds and anything else he could make a lot of noise with. Initially I slept through most of the booming noise, until I heard a thundering loud crashing of metal and tile flooring right next to me. My eyes flashed open to see that the MTI had flipped a bed over that had a fellow trainee on it that was not moving fast enough. I swiftly jumped out of my bed as fast as though it were on fire. I rushed to get changed, shaved, and my teeth brushed, in the overly crowded latrine with only eight sinks and fifty of us that needed to use them. As a flight we all fell into a formation of four single file lines organized from shortest in the back and tallest in the front. Our MTI would then march us to the training pad for an intense early morning workout. We did many different forms of stretches and calisthenics then ended with a mile long run. After the strenuous workout we regrouped back into the formation and got marched back to the dorms. There we had twenty minutes to get showered, changed and our beds made then to be back down outside and into formation to get ready to fall in to the chow hall for breakfast. This was no easy task, because there were eight shower heads in the