I was in the Marines but only served 17 months so never deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan and never been on a ship deployment. My mother got cancer and since I was the only responsible child I got a hardship discharge so I could help take care of her while she went through chemo and recovery.
It was weird serving because my mom's husband/stepfather was a NOI Muslim and that whole side of the family was either NOI, very militant, or hotep. Not the stereotypical type but militant nonetheless. I went a good chunk of my adolescence and early teens hearing about the white man is the devil, not to join the white man's military, etc so ending up in the military was kind of funny and ironic.
I went in older than the average recruit and everyone in my platoon was 17-19 years old. It was hard for me to adjust because not only was I
compared to the others but was so used to having my own place, full time job, not being told what to do, etc to go to having my life regimented for three months was really shocking. A lot of recruits had never left their hometown, never had a job or at least a full time job, never lived away from their parents, etc so they were fascinated by me because I had done things they've never experienced yet.
If you do enlist
GET EVERYTHING YOUR RECRUITER PROMISES YOU IN WRITING. They will lie and say anything to get you in because at the end of the day they're salesmen and their job is to meet their quota. When I enlisted it was at the height of the Iraq War over a decade ago when they were struggling to meet their goals so it might be better now.
I have a few more stories but probably not as interesting as others since I didn't serve long.