Well yesterday I found out that I can not be commissioned over 42 years old(for nursing and most other officer ranks), which I will be after nursing school. So then I thought back and really thought about what my motivation was for this .

Retirement is the only thing I could come up with. After this enlistment I will have 10 years left in the military and in order to maximize my retirement benefits I need to be an officer. I will put some tables together so you can see the difference between a enlisted retirement and an officer retirement.

I started asking around and doing some research and have developed a new plan in order to reach my retirement goal. I have 3 years left on the enlistment and during that time I need to complete my pre-requisites for a Physician Assistant program, which in most cases are less than the nursing requirements. The next step will be to get out of the military and take advantage of the New GI Bill and go to PA school, which is usually 2 years. At that time I will be 45ish and will be able to come back into the military as a direct commission officer, probably an O-3 – do my 10 years and retire. It seems a little ass backwards but it fits my situation.

Right now I am compiling a list of colleges that I am interested in and will also fit my situation. I will post that in a few days.

I will start changing the links to reflect PA stuff but I will also keep up the nursing stuff but just consolidate it, it really is a great program for younger (lol) enlisted guys.