Thought of something else that was good for COT and any other commissioning folks

[carolinapooh, BSN, RN]

Hi all - just thought of this. You have to take your own laundry soap. Let me suggest the Purex all-in-one sheets - they pack easily and work like a charm. They were one of the best things I had at COT, and you can buy refills at the commissary (by the time you need refills, you'll have base privileges). I will say I took the original pack and a refill with me, but you can get them on base.

[mobro]

when you went to COT did you just purchase everything on the 'COT uniform checklist' and then you were good to go? i'm curious if once you're commissioned the recruiter still helps you make sure you're ready to go with everything you need or if you're supposed to hunt down everything on your own. is this worth stressing out about or should i just stop freaking out? it just seems like an awful lot of uniform details that could go horribly wrong and make for a bad experience...

[carolinapooh, BSN, RN]

You will have plenty, plenty of priors there to help you with uniforms. If your recruiter will help, great - mine didn't, but then again, my mother is a retiree dependent and I went ahead and got a reservist ID card - in other words, she knew I knew how to work the system. Sometimes that worked against me!

The women at the BXs who work in the military clothing sales section will know everything you need (I mean at another base, not Maxwell - they pushed people into buying stuff that didnt' fit - I saw it many times). I had lots of help at the three bases I had to go to to get what I needed.

They say to buy two uniforms (ABUs) - I would buy at least three, or otherwise you'll spend a bunch of time doing more laundry. Three is a better number and really, you'll probably need them anyway. I know they're expensive, but if you can afford it, I'd do it.

I'd get an extra pair of boots at a surplus store if you can, because your regular ones are going to get torn up in COT.

Unfortunately the uniform list is pretty accurate - but I could have gotten by with two blues shirts (one short sleeve, one long).

Get TWO of each for the name tags for your blues - two plastic and two metal. Always have one and a spare.

Please, please, PLEASE - if no one here takes any of my other advice - GET EVERY UNIFORM ITEM YOU CAN BEFORE YOU GET THERE. I saw so many alterations errors while I was there...plus, you won't have to deal with the huge "cattle call" that the trips over to clothing sales seemed to become.

Another bit of advice - women can wear either the men's short blues jacket or the women's. I really recommend the men's jacket - to me, it's a bit nicer (it's gathered at the bottom) and I'm long in the torso, so it fits me better.

If you do try to get everything beforehand and there's something you CAN'T get for whatever reason, don't worry about that - you'll be able to get it once you're down there. I couldn't find the short blues jacket to fit, but I found one down there. It wasn't a problem.

I do recommend that little uniform book wtbcrna was talking about - it's in a little package and comes with a ruler to measure out where all your stuff goes on your blues. I'm a huge reg nut, and I knew where most of the stuff went, but even I used my roommate's. Very helpful item.

[midinphx, BSN]

I'm writing all this advice down! If you think of any more, I'll listen. Thanks.