Oct. 17 - Oct. 19

October 17 Drill competition this morning. Everyone was nervous. Nobody wanted to lose but we were all afraid because of how incredibly rare it is for a class to win. Our DI happens to be the head of the Drill Committee for the whole of OCS so to lose with him as our DI would be very bad for us. We showed up, lots of sweaty palms and high nerves. I was furiously reminding people that everyone will try to speed up and that we need to keep things slow and deliberate. The scoring system is by percent, you need an 85% to win. The last class got a 74%, a pretty normal score. We all just wanted that 85. The competition came, very tense with every DI at OCS walking around with red clipboards. Competition ended, we all stood there nervously, and the Master Gunnery Sgt came up and said “Your score was 91. Well done.” Oh Lord it was hard for us to maintain bearing! Not only did we get the streamer that no class since 15-11 got, we set a new freakin high score! Nobody has been above 90 since they changed the scoring system awhile back. Sprinted back to our hallway, waited for our DI to come back. When he arrived he put us on our faces for the 9% worth of mistakes, but then got us together and gave us the happiest speech I’ve ever heard out of him. He only swore a few times, and ended it with a “That’s the shit right there.” We were shocked. Words of approval sound SO foreign in his voice. We were all so proud that nobody minded the pushups at all, they were like victory pushups! OCS is already buzzing about how 04-12 got the drill streamer. Feels good for me especially since I worked with so many people for so long working out the kinks. I’m getting a lot of thanks and congrats from the class. Ugh, but the fantastic morning gives way to class. Had to struggle to stay awake the whole time, it is SUCH TORTURE. I had to stand in the back for the first two classes, and almost fell asleep standing up during the second. The third class was an engineering class and actually managed to hold my attention enough to merit sitting down. Classes are over now. I was just writing an email to my recruiter requesting OHARP duty so I can work in Reno a bit between OCS and IWBC (information warfare school) when the fire alarm went off and we all had to sprint out of the building and form up on the football field. The DI’s passed the time by sharking the crap out of us. It was an annual fire drill, pretty damn annoying. The other DI’s all seem to be after us today. That drill streamer may as well have been a bullseye. It actually sucks having it. And straight back into the fire. We just lost 3 more classmates, they apparently failed the sea power final. I don’t know why losing classmates is sending me straight down into depression, I would expect to just be sad and feel sorry for them, but I feel so much more than that. It’s overwhelming me. The thought of what they are feeling right now just absolutely kills me, I can’t stand it. I just can’t take it. This turned out to be a very long day. Long and terrible. Having something to celebrate ended up being a curse, the happiness brought me back to normal for awhile and I had to come to terms with being at OCS again. Losing more classmates… that just kills me. We’ve lost probably around 30% of our original members at this point, and I miss them. Going to try to sleep as much as possible, so goodnight. October 18 High ropes course today. We woke up early for breakfast and in the chow hall we had to listen to Rozell, one of the four we lost to RLP, getting absolutely torn apart by GySgt Cross (the DI for 05-12). He’s taking so much sharking after getting rolled. How he’s still sane I’ll never know. Anyway the ropes course was extremely easy. Crawl across two parallel ropes, then across one rope, then across two single rope bridges, then across two sets of ropes that were one above another, then an unsuspended rope bridge, upside down rope crawl, a tarzan swing over a whopping 6 feet and a zipline to the bottom. The only even mildly challenging bit was the bridge, a lot fell off but I didn’t. It took all morning to complete and they only gave us a little bit to eat at around noon so I’m pretty hungry. The worst part is that since it took so long to get everyone through I had lots of time to sit and reflect on the misery. I hate it so much. We just lost another classmate. Our class’s medical body, Pierce, just failed the review board after failing the test, so she’s off to H-class. As our med body she worked really hard for us, it was a difficult job that she had volunteered to do. She got nothing but less sleep and study time for all that extra work, and now she’s rolled for it. I’m just… numb. Can’t take it in. Our class CPO just came into our p-way and RPT’d the crap out of all of us. Apparently some people didn’t fill out the ropes course evaluation forms out properly, leaving the instructor name or date blank. So we all got beat. Mine was filled in properly… For some reason while I was doing squats my left knee just started hurting like I’d slammed it into the floor or something. It has kept up all evening, I’m limping up and down stairs pretty noticeably. I need to keep it hidden. They’ll put me in med hold and if I miss something important they’ll roll me for it. I have the balls to four watch shift tonight. I’m so afraid. If I fall asleep or get tired and lean against the wall or fail to give someone a greeting, and if I get RPT’d for it with this knee I just know they’ll send me to med hold. Miss something because of med hold and you roll. OCS isn’t a school at all, it’s just a torture chamber. It’s almost strange how desperately I want to speak to a counselor right now. I'm just desperate for someone to help me work through these mental/emotional struggles I'm having out here. I won’t write my thoughts down in one of these letters. I write them constantly to keep track of myself, but they’re very, very hard to read because the message is so dark. The letters I’m getting from you all are keeping me alive out here more than you may realize. Bedtime for now, gotta wake up again in less than 4 hours. Love you all. October 19 The hopes for that tolerable OCS where we spend our days studying are dead. Just as my future seemed a bit brighter, it all goes back to hell. This morning was torture. Our DI just kept beating us harder and harder. My arms have never hurt so bad, I seriously had absolutely nothing left to hold myself up with. I’ve never experienced such exhaustion. Then we went to breakfast while getting screamed at and a meeting where we were all blamed for becoming complacent and more threats. Also we were lectured by our class officer about how it’s so unusual for a class to lose as many as we are losing this late in the game and how it’s our fault. It’s not that we’re any different from any other class, it’s just that we have DiCosimo and he doesn’t care. Managed to stay awake in class, though after standing watch from 0000 to 0400 I’m not even sure how the hell I managed. We saw Pierce at lunch in H-class (well, we heard her at lunch, since we can’t look around). It’s so hard to listen to, she’s still crying. More classes after lunch, VERY hard to keep myself awake. I’m so exhausted. We were supposed to have drill practice but it’s raining pretty hard so that’s been cancelled. We just lost classmates again. After our noon class we got the word that the other 2 people from our class who went to the academic review board were rolled. Ruizburerra and Negronruiz. Ruizburerra was a former Navy enlisted girl, didn’t know her too well. Negronruiz is from Mexico and is still learning English, he lived across the pway from me so I talked to him constantly and helped him with rifle drill, and Deighan helped him with studies. He had a very difficult time reading the questions. He’s a smart guy, it’s just that OCS has no place for those with a special need. I just can’t keep taking these hits. I can’t stand it. I’m right back to I-week, just so desperate to make it stop. I feel overwhelming sadness and guilt. Winding down now, almost time for bed. We’ll be getting less sleep now because 05-12’s DI has told us we can’t use the bathrooms when we normally use them because now his class will use them during that timeframe so we have to get up earlier. Our DI, of course, doesn’t care. Shocking. I’m so excited to get to bed after today’s struggles against sleepiness. Goodnight.