What is family life really like for an ATC?

Been with my wife 4 years now, married less than a year, no kids. Been doing atc from the get go. It was always abundantly clear I was gonna have a fucked schedule. It took a while for her to get used to and the "why can't you just get this day off next week" took even more, but shes accepted it as part of our life and we make it work.

Honestly you learn to plan around it. You work your 40 (barring ot) and you are done. No phone calls. No emails. You drive out the gate and you start your outside of work life. Hell I don't even really hang with coworkers outside of work because in general I like to avoid shop talk when I'm not there(or maybe I'm a huge antisocial doucher, it's up in the air). I generally enjoy life.

My wife seems to not mind it,she works a regular schedule we plan things in advance and frankly date nights on weeknights are great because it's easy to get a table, things aren't packed and I can get more shit done with a weekday or two off. If you aren't staying out till the asscrack of dawn it's still doable going out on weekends if you have a day shift. It's honestly not that bad.

Oh and we can afford a couple vacations a year, looking into buying a boat in the future and the benefits are hard to beat, which is huge on the family/future planning side of things.

Is it ideal 100 percent of the time? Nope. Is he gonna miss little Timmy's baseball games? Probably. Is it workable of you want it to work? Absolutely.
 
Here’s a positive spin when you’re married and have kids- if your spouse works a regular 9-5 MthruF and you’re a controller working weekends, you only need a babysitter/daycare 3 days a week when the kids are young. ??
 
Married for 4 years, controller for almost 5. The pay and benefits of a lowly level 5 tower have allowed my wife to stay home since she was 5 mo pregnant and now we have a 16 month old. There are definitely stressors, but much less than a "regular" life. I can't imagine going back to a private-job life and doing anything else. The training will be your hardest time, but if you have a little patience and your fiance really focuses on work when he's at work and you two when he's at home everything will be fine. He'll get plenty of time to train and his co-workers and trainers will be understanding.
 
GMX said:
Except missing his family to work on academy pay, provide health care, pay bills, and get set up for a career that will ultimately see the family well taken care of in the future.
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Which is exactly what everyone else who attends the Academy does.
 
My wife and I just had our first baby a couple of months ago. I'm training at an upper level up/down and shes in residency as an ER doc. So you can imagine that we both work all types of different shifts. If you want to make it work, you will. Everything worthwhile requires sacrifice. Cant imagine not being with someone because of schedule (assuming that person is usually home every 24 hours) but everyone is different I guess. Good that you're at least getting info now instead of going through with the wedding and then realizing.
 
trvcoastaviator said:
My wife and I just had our first baby a couple of months ago. I'm training at an upper level up/down and shes in residency as an ER doc. So you can imagine that we both work all types of different shifts. If you want to make it work, you will. Everything worthwhile requires sacrifice. Cant imagine not being with someone because of schedule (assuming that person is usually home every 24 hours) but everyone is different I guess. Good that you're at least getting info now instead of going through with the wedding and then realizing.
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Good lord, does wiping your ass with $20 ever make it raw?
Edit: just read that it was residency. Anyways let me know in the future how ur bhole handles that.
 
SugarFoot1 said:
Im usually the type to lose my shit on someone that comes on here saying some garbage like that. So many nice long responses made me just stay out of it. Let his ass go work at Lowe’s and y’all struggle to pay a mortgage and all the other expenses. Enjoy those holidays eating crackers and ketchup tho!!
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I'm gonna go to the sportsbook and bet my 1.6% June raise that the original post was a troll. With all these hot takes no sincere human would allow a thread w such possibilities to stagnate and die...would they? you got us good "atcfiance" . and you woulda got away w it if it wasnt for us darn kidz ?

 
SINCE THE POPCORN IS OUT,

Well, to the original poster, whatever you decide, hopefully your fiancé doesn’t get placed someplace far from home, certify then try to transfer at least the next state over from home, get picked up, go ahead and move you back home in preparation, live up the “single” life without you there while he’s waiting out the release date, get stalked by the Tinder ho’s he’s been hooking up with while you were away, then you find out and leave his cheating ass... then he ends up quitting the FAA because he decided he doesn’t want you to actually leave him because he will look bad when people find out why, so he quits and lives close to home with you on another job and then a year later tries to get back in on a rehire bid after he talks you into staying.

A buddy I went to the academy with worked with a guy that did this, what a gem, eh? But her fiancé prob isn’t this douchy of a guy and probably not a doormat enough to move 15x for that type of guy amirite??😉😉
 
vectorwagon said:
SINCE THE POPCORN IS OUT,

Well, to the original poster, whatever you decide, hopefully your fiancé doesn’t get placed someplace far from home, certify then try to transfer at least the next state over from home, get picked up, go ahead and move you back home in preparation, live up the “single” life without you there while he’s waiting out the release date, get stalked by the Tinder ho’s he’s been hooking up with while you were away, then you find out and leave his cheating ass... then he ends up quitting the FAA because he decided he doesn’t want you to actually leave him because he will look bad when people find out why, so he quits and lives close to home with you on another job and then a year later tries to get back in on a rehire bid after he talks you into staying.

A buddy I went to the academy with worked with a guy that did this, what a gem, eh? But her fiancé prob isn’t this douchy of a guy and probably not a doormat enough to move 15x for that type of guy amirite??😉😉
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oh no you di-nnnnt. After reading this atc_fiancee be like....

 
GulfBravoPapa said:
Which is exactly what everyone else who attends the Academy does.
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And as such, it's not "zero responsibilities" for a newborn. Just saying.

And like the other guy said the OP must be a troll anyway. No responses after all this? She said she doesn't want to make him choose between her or the career he wants...well that's exactly the context of her post (if even real). If it's real they need to pay someone for some real pre-marriage counseling or get with their church or something. If it's legit then these doubts need to be reconciled before a real marriage takes place.
 

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