re: Anyone joined the national guard later in life?

The worst thing is you will be going through basic training with a bunch of 17 year olds.

Doing what? I’d be interested.

I enlisted in the Navy Reserve at 34. Hope this helps.

I decided to become a FF/medic at 37 in South Florida. After all my certs were completed I ended up getting hired at 40. Best decision I ever made. I know it’s not the national guard, but still government. Also, south Florida is one of the most competitive places to be a firefighter because of the pay, benefits, pension, Kelly day’s etc. I say all this because I was doing ad sales before, and after I were to ‘retire’ health care was going to be a bitch as well as hoping my 401k would be enough. I can still retire at 25 years with my full pension. I’m assuming your timeline would be around the same.

If you’re going to do it. Do it now. Wish I would have done it earlier. Long run it’s the best decision.

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And getting screamed at by Drill Sergeants who are still in their early 20s and have never even deployed

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As I said. I went through the fire department. But it was about the same. A bunch of teenagers and 20 year olds. A few older guys. Most of the instructors were all younger than me. Just put your ego aside. So what, just play the game. I did for 13 weeks and then probation. I was able to keep up with most of those guys, I’m sure you will to. I found being more mature with life experiences was an asset

Thank you! I would appreciate that.

I joined the ARNG and spent 20 years in…retired as a Major. It was hard on my wife and two sons …being away from them for extended periods of time. We were activated for Desert Shield/ Desert Storm and required an almost year deployment to Kuwait /Iraq.

If you join… your unit will eventually be activated to federal duty and deployed. The army depends heavily on the NG and Reserves these days. One drill weekend a month and two weeks of annual training each summer was hard on our family. I am thankful now because I have two pensions and retired military benefits. Having Medicare and Tricare is great. Tricare saves my wife and I thousands each year in meds, surgeries, doctor visits, etc.

I have no idea what military benefits will be like 20 years from now because Congress keeps cutting away at future benefits.
Just know if you join …and stay in…. it’s a huge commitment.

Good luck with your decision.
HOOAH!

There was a guy at Basic who was 42 years old who was Natty Guard when I was in. It’s rare, but it does happen. Age waivers are easier to obtain than drug, moral, and medical at MEPS.

A lot of the comments are lacking context around what MOS you choose, and how in demand it is globally. If you're a fuel supply specialist (gas station attendant) they're nearly always going to find a way to send the 19 year old dickwad over you to Syria. SatCom specialist? You're probably deploying every single time. Ask the people that have given you DM information about that.

On the money side, if you're afraid that teacher retirement isn't enough at 34, you have time to do something about it. This is a correctable problem, and at your age, depending on how old your kids are, not worth it for purely financial reasons.

For health care, just switch to a high deductible plan with a medical savings account that rolls over. Once your kids are about second grade, they stop "needing" to go to the doctor every month for green snot, and the money just builds over time to pay for braces, and eventually your diapers in 40 years.