Was there a turning point in your military career?

I can say that when I received PCS orders to Germany is the turning point of my career. I was as mid-career Staff Sergeant at that time and I was coming from 4th Psychological Operations Group (Airborne) in Ft. Bragg. In the eight years I spent as a PSYOP SPC/NCO, I completed five separate deployments, so needless to say, the OPTEMPO was pretty high. At that time I was single, I was gun-ho, and my team mates were my family so I signed every dwell memo I could so that I could get on every deployment I could get to. Well that changed when I got married and had kids. Naturally, who wants to be away when you've got a beautiful wife and awesome kids right? So my CSM knew my past committment to the unit and he asked what I wanted to do next. Well my wife wanted to go to Europe...happy wife, happy life right? So he personally called the branch manager and found me an 37F slot as a Observer-Controller/Trainer at JMRC (Hohenfels). This ended up being a blessing in disguise. For one, I was in a non-deployable unit for the first time in my career...perfect timing for the birth of my second son. I was able to spend a lot of time with the family, we were in EUROPE, and of course the wife was happy. But as far as my career...I was on the Brigade OC Team, made up of senior officers and senior NCOs that were experienced and seasoned leaders. With working so closely with such great professionals, they saw potential in me that I never really gave any thought to. I was content with where I was at, I was most likely going to pick up E-7 on my first look, and I would have went back to Ft. Bragg and likely been a Detachment Sergeant. But they urged me to pursue a commission because they believed in my leadership style and potential. So I did just that, I applied for the Green to Gold slot and I got it. Now I'm 12 years in, I'm leading a platoon, and I've got whole different career still ahead of me. I don't know how many more years my body will let me do this profession, but to this day I feel great and I'm excited for the career path that I've chosen. I owe it to all the great leaders that I had the pleasure to work with over there at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center. Hooah, Airborne!

I was hauled in to work as an S1 clerk, seeing the other side of the Corps made me realize that all Marines are not alike. I excelled, was recognized, promoted and sent to my dream schools....so it turned my feelings about the service around.