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Thinking of Joining

bennerman

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Alo. So I'm thinking of joining the Forces, and I have a few questions:

1. I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of "ask your local recruiter"'s, which is fine. What I am wondering is, if I ask the recruitment medical officer something before applying, will it be on my file when I decide to apply? Basically, are questions before enlisting "off the record"?

2. In "step 4" on forces.ca ( http://www.forces.ca/en/page/applynow-100#step4-5 ), it says "After the medical exam, your medical records and history will be reviewed by military medical staff. [...] You will not be disqualified based on a diagnosis or disease. ". Does that mean, for example "a) A staph infection when you were 5 doesn't matter because you recovered fully". Or "b) You had a history of depression during your teen years, but you are no longer depressed, so it doesn't matter." Basically, if a recruit has a history of depression, ADHD, and asthma, but they are all controlled WITHOUT MEDICATION, does it make much of a difference to them?

3. I am currently "pre-training", which is about 8 hours a day of focus exercises, strength training, cardio, coordination exercises, etc. The "WHY WON'T THE CF HIRE ME???" thread says you should learn extra skills. I intend to bring that up to about 10 hours a day with lock picking, archery, knife throwing, and parkour practice, as well as martial arts lessons. While a few of those won't impress the recruiters, they will improve my coordination, focus, motor skills, and possibly show my dedication. What other skills do you recommend?

4. What else can I do to improve my chances?

I have set the date at which I will apply at about 9 months, so I have plenty of time to tweak my training.


I'll ask more questions as I think of them. Sorry if this thread is stupid, and/or a rehash of existing threads.

Thanks for your help.
 
Instead of learning how to throw knifes and pick locks, etc perhaps you should invest your time with upgrading your education, volunteering, etc. Those are things that will actually make you stand out and benefit you.  I don't think you need to dedicate 8-10 hours a day to "pre training".

 
I don't think it could hurt. I need to improve my coordination and focus anyways. I could always add volunteering and education to my training. Good idea. Thanks.
 
To answer a few things, as a general rule, you're not going to get specific answers to your medical stuff until the medical is done - a dceision will be made then about whether you need to provide information from your treating physician(s) regarding your depression/ADD-ADHD (which is purely speculation on my part due to what you seem to think you need to "pre-train" for 8 hours a day).

While the wording "you won't be disqualified based on a diagnosis or disease" is true, it's also misleading; depending where in the spectrum of your disorders you are or were, due to statistical likelihood of recurrence, decompensation, adaptability to military life, etc, you can be disqualifed, whether on or off medications.

If you want to "pre-train" regarding focus and mental gymnastics, try doing stuff like brain training books - crosswords, mental math, that sort of thing, since it'll help you a lot with the aptitude testing. I'd not mention too much about your knife throwing and lock picking stuff - looks a bit too much like you're wanting to learn military skills for evil instead of good...we're supposed to use our skills for good.

:2c:

Good luck to you.

MM
 
medicineman, I didn't mean to give you the wrong impression, the purpose of the lockpicking is to improve my fine motor skills and focus, and knife throwing is to improve my throwing, gross motor skills, stuff like that. I want to join because of my life-long desire to help people.

I should explain that I have below average coordination and trouble with focusing, so I need to work on them. Hence the huge training load. Not only that, but it is also quite fulfilling mentally and emotionally. Before I started this, I wasn't making much progress in anything.

I also don't want you to think that this pre-training is an ordeal or hardship for me. I enjoy it a lot. I don't see the harm in doing all of this if a) it'll increase my physical and mental fitness, and b) I enjoy it.

I'll consider the brain training books. Again, good idea.

Thanks for your help.
 
I wasn't thinking your pre-training was an ordeal - but 8 hours a day is a full work day for most people.  An hour or two a day on fitness training, mental stuff comes with what you do during the day.  If you need work on mental focus, traditional martial arts will help with that...but you are also evaluated on a lot of thinking things, so your education has to be there.  The recruiters are looking for folks that are well rounded - academically, mentally, physically and societally - I'm thinking you might want to dedicate some of that time to rounding out the whole package.  If you're finding you really need to work on motor skills, again martial arts are useful, but so are other sports like tennis, badminton, baseball, basketball, gymnastics...see where I'm going with this?  You need to be able to coordinate the whole package to perform well in those.  When I hear things like knife throwing and lock picking, I hear someone either trying too hard, bragging or who really doesn't get what we're about.

Again, just me on outside looking in.

MM
 
You could join a sports team or club during the 9 months you've allotted. Squash is easy to pick up and would help you out with your coordination and focus, any raquet sport for that matter...
 
I'm no expert (I'm still in the early stages of applying so don't quote me), but I have the impression that team sports are useful, both in terms of proving you can work in a team and in terms of getting you in shape.
 
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