MEPS day 2 has now officially been the worst experience in my entire life. And I’ve gone through a lot in life. So far, nothing is as bad as MEPS day 2, at least until I hit bootcamp. I will just explain things step by step from my experience. Yours may vary as a lot of the order you do things in is random. Either way, it’s all getting done at one point or another. And my timings may be off here, as I was so tired I was delirious. But you’ll get the basics here:

• Dullaghan drops me and another guy off at the Double Tree hotel at about 5:45pm. We ride down to the basement level and sign in with a lady right outside the doors, who mysteriously knew who we were before we said anything.
• She mumbles the rules of the hotel, where we can and cannot go, and that we had to be back in that room at 8:45pm to watch some video. So much for me going to bed at 6pm as I had planned, since we were going to be getting up at 4:30 am
• She hands us our room key and tells us where to get dinner. We head up to our room to drop off our stuff. Dullaghan heads home, and we head up to the 4th floor.
• After hanging out in the room for a bit we decide to head down for some dinner. We enter the dining room and order. The food is not bad. I get a very large cheeseburger (we’re talking fancy restaurant style) and some fries. There’s also a small buffet.
• We sit down and eat. We notice two others eating alone at separate tables. We one by one invite them over to our table, and eat and chat.
• After dinner we went back to the room and relaxed for a while. Waiting for the 8:45 video.
• At 8:40 we head down to the basement to watch the video. It’s quite boring and quite pointless. I guess it’s more for the teenagers than anything else. Just a bunch of “Dont do this” and other rules.
• After the video they offer you cookies and a drink. My roomie stays downstairs to use the gym, I head up to try to wind down and get some sleep.
• About 2am I finally drift off to sleep ….
• *BEEP* BEEP *BEEP* … 4:30am the alarm sounds
• We flop out of bed and get dressed and ready. We will not be coming back to the room. We head down for the 4:45am breakfast.
• The breakfast is decent. Bacon, eggs, etc. It’s hard to eat with 2 hours of sleep and a lot of anxiety. I manage to inhale a banana. We come across the two we had dinner with the night before, and all sit and chat for a bit.
• 5:15am the buses pull up and we all get in line with our stuff. It is freezing outside and raining. A few miles north of us there is snow in Atlanta. My daughter’s school is even closed because of the freezing rain and snow. We get to stand in line to get on the bus in this rain. We are all quite frozen.
• 5:45am We arrive at the MEPS. We unload from the bus and wait in line again in the pouring down 28 degree rain.
• 6:00am After finally getting inside MEPS, we one by one get scanned with the metal detectors and put our bags through the X-ray machine. We then store our bags in a sideroom and get in line at the processing desk
• They check your paperwork and give you a sticker for your shirt with your name and barcode on it. You are then told to go sit in my favorite place, the main waiting room. Get used to this room, you will see a lot of it.
• After an hour or so of waiting they take us back to the medical area. We wait in line in a classroom. The guy we are waiting to see has a computer and a box of files. We trade papers with him (he takes some and gives some) and are then moved along to the medical waiting room.
• Next we are placed in a classroom and instructed on how to fill out about 4 pages of medical questionnaires. You leave the classroom and head back to the medical waiting area.
• As you enter the room, wondering where to go (the people at MEPS assume you know what to do and never tell you were to go) a large gentleman to your left tells you the exact row to sit in (he uses the rows to remember who has to do what still).
• When it is your turn he takes your blood pressure and your picture. After which you sit back down in a different (ready for next step) row and wait. For a long time.
• About an hour later a doctor steps out of the side door and calls my name. I takes me back into his office and has me sit in a chair next to his desk. I noticed a space heater blowing right on me, and wondered why, as it was already warm enough in there, and this heater was literally about 6 inches from my chair.
• After answering a ton of medical questions about myself, he tells me to strip to my boxers. He has me do some different motion displays I guess to see my joints work.
• Next he tells me to drop my boxers and turn my head left. He feels and prods around my man parts and has me cough.
• Then he tells me to face the window (which is ground level and the blinds are open by the way, into a parking lot) and bend over and spread my cheeks.
• Next he tells me to get dressed and head back to the waiting area and sit in yet another row
• I sit in this row for about another half hour to an hour. Then my row gets called in for a hearing test. We walk into another backroom
• For the hearing test they first gave us our instructions. And if we didn’t follow them exactly (as in do not move when the test is done until I say you can) then we are done with processing and disqualified. We are then put into soundproof boxes with headphones and a clicker. The headphones are so tight that your brain almost comes out of your nose and mouth. The test begins
• This test is #3 in my most horrible moments in MEPS. #2 being the doctor checking my balloon knot and man parts. #1 will be explained later. This test is bad because the noise is so feint, that you literally have to hold your breath to hear anything at all. And the test lasts 15 minutes. Even holding my breath and not moving a single muscle, I could never tell if it was a sound or just atoms moving about in the air. It was that difficult. Once it ended, he left us sitting there for a good 15 more minutes. Not allowed to move or take off the death grip headphones. Finally he gave us our scores and lead us back to …. yup, the waiting room and a new row to sit in
• Next I was called up for the vision test. This was my favorite part of the day. Look into one of those binocular looking devices. Read the smallest line you can read, a few times with each eye, and both eyes. Then she flips through a bunch of those two color dots pictures that shows a number and tests to see if you are colorblind. This entire test took about 5 minutes and was easy. Now back out to the waiting area and another row.
• About another thirty minutes later my row was lined up for yet another room. The blood draw. One by one we go in and get a test tube of blood taken from us. Directly from this room I am told to head down the hall to the right and wait outside the Urinalysis door.
• After about 15 minutes the door opens and they bring me into this restroom that is a line of urinals on one wall (no dividers) with a line of sinks on the other side. Above each urinal is a cup and a jar. On the far wall opposite the door is a sliding window, kind of like where you would sign in at a doctor’s office.
• We are told to fill the cup. After many minutes of straining to pee for an audience, I finally get the 60ml of pee out. He tells us to then transfer it to the other cup with the lid and seal it. Then bring the cup to the window.
• At the window they put a tape on the lid to show if it gets tampered with, and have you sign something to match your sample with the serial number on the tape. You are then told to wash your hands and go back to the waiting room
• Back in the waiting room we sit for over an hour. Maybe two. It’s hard to tell anymore, as most of your time here is spent waiting. But when this session of waiting ends, it ends with a bang. Time for the #1 most excruciating thing of the day.
• We are all led into a room. The room is about the size of normal size convenience store, minus the shelves and isles and everything else. Just the square footage. One wall has a long bench and coat hooks. The other wall has a desk and a computer. The wall opposite the door has a scale and a large metal plate with measurements on it (for height measuring). The floor is a rock solid and freezing cold shiny stone whatever it is they have in schools. You know, like the school cafeteria floor.
• We are told to line up on the bench and strip to our underwear. Then we sit, for about 20 minutes, shivering and freezing, as the man shuffles with paperwork.
• Finally he tells us to stand up and pick a spot (there are numbers all over the floor). He then says we are to follow his instructions exactly, he will not repeat them, etc. Typical military stuff.
• He has us do various things with our arms first. Straight up, straight out, full rotation of the shoulders, etc.
• Then he goes to the legs. Keep in mind we are standing in our underwear on a cold hard floor shivering. We now have to balance (shivering) on one foot and do various kicks forward and backwards while he watches. Also some tip toe up and down stuff. He has us go across the room on our tip toes and back. And then across the room on our heels only then back.
• Now he has us squat but on our tip toes. And we cannot let the rest of our foot touch the floor. We are told to do squats, but on our tip toes only. Up and down ten times. Next we are to go from a squat position (on our toes) to our knees (toes still bent under, no shin touching the ground). If our knees do not hit the ground simultaneously, we must do it again. Those of us on our knees and toes on this cold hard floor must wait while others do it over and over again to get it right. Then we are to walk across the room on only our knees. By the end of that my knees were bruised from the stone freezing floor.
• Next we are told to duck walk across the room and back. With bruised knees, sore toes, and freezing. We have to stay squatted, and with a full ‘heel to toe’ motion we must cross the room and back, without falling over. It is very painful
• Next we are told to walk as fast as we can without running, all the way around the room in single file. And then line back up on the brown line on the floor
• Now we go one by one to the scale. And then to the measuring device, which is solid stainless steel. You have to press your back up against the entire thing, and as if you were not already frozen enough, this thing made every man in there jump and squeal like a girl. It was freezing. When you are done you return to the bench and wait.
• We are finally told to get dressed, get our paperwork, and that we all have passed the medical portion of the day. We are to head back to the good old main waiting area in MEPS.
• We sit here for hours, waiting for the guidance counselor to call your name. Eventually he does though. You go in and sit down with him. You go through a ton of questions. All the same information you’ve gone through a dozen times already. And all with 2 hours of sleep under your belt. Finally you go through the available MOSs for you. You work with that for a while and decide what you want to do. He will try everything he can to get you were they want you, not where you want to be. It’s like buying a new car. You have to play hardball. They told me there was no possible way to get into the MOS I wanted because of availability. I told him I guess I wouldn’t be joining the Army then. But somehow, to make a few hours of waiting and phonecalls story short, I got my MOS.
• Next you do a few rounds of taking paperwork here and there. Mainly between the liaison and the main desk. Take this to this person, they do something, then take more papers to that person. Rinse and repeat for a good hour or so.
• Eventually they send you to another room for fingerprinting. They do quite a thorough job, but with a scanner, so no ink to worry about.
• Now you wait for the next available swear in ceremony. They tell you it could be anywhere between 1 to 3 hours. You sit in the good old waiting room again.
• Finally called in, you enter a small classroom and told to read the papers in the basket under your chair. They are the usual “No sexual harassment in the army, no desertion during wartime or you can be punished by death” etc.
• Then an officer comes in and walks you through your contract and what is about to happen at the swear in.
• He then takes you into the next room and teaches you the proper way to stand at attention and at ease. You practice that a few times and then he leaves you standing at attention (gets painful too) and leaves the room
• You hear the door opening and closing and people coming in behind you. You stay perfectly still, not knowing if it is an officer, or just more people. It is actually your audience. Your recruiter, family, or whoever came to watch.
• Next a very intimidating officer comes in with his blues on and shiny metallic things all over. He’s very “military” so be sure you answer everything he says very loudly, and with a ’sir’ on the end. Or you will be standing there for quite some time at attention listening to him get angry.
• You then raise your right hand and repeat the oath. It’s easy, as he does it one small chunk at a time.
• You then are lead back into that prior classroom and told to stand next to your desks. Remember to follow all his orders precisely. He is actually testing you. If he says to have your pen sitting on top of your contract then do it. If he says pass everything forward and then to the left, do it exactly in that order.
• He leaves the room after instructing you to take turns taking a survey on the computer in the corner. The survey is a “customer satisfaction” on the entire MEPS process. I thought it was quite funny after all that hell, and lack of sleep, they wanted my opinions on it all. I didn’t hold any punches either.
• Now you go back to the liaison office. You have a lot of papers to sign. And a lot of explanations of things such as benefits, service terms, etc. At this point you are too tired and ready to leave to hear it. I still don’t know a word of what he said or what I signed. I just had to get out of there.
• You are given an army bag of goodies, your paperwork, and sent on your way.
• Go find your recruiter, have him sign you out, and get the hell out of there!!!

None of this is going to sink in for the rest of the night. You will wake up the next day and wonder if it was all just a dream. And then you realize … you are the property of the United States Army!