So you'll have your twenty (or more) in, in 2012? Well, that's that not to far away and you, and everyone else have to expect the unexpected. Being a SNCO is better than an NCO, as I was, but being an E-7 would of course be even be a lot better than an E-6.
Oh.....I'm very intimate with the Naval medical personnel and with the civilian personnel in the VA, as well. Many of those "Squid Corps" docs were miserable SOB's when I was in, but the best guys I knew were the FMF Corpsman. You couldn't keep those boys down. Most of the Docs were okay, but many were rotten to the core, and I can still remember their faces to this day.
I "sometimes" wonder if I erred and should have attended college First before enlisting in the Marine Corps, but if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't change a thing............Not ONE single thing.
Hope everything works out for you, Staff Sergeant!
Watch your back and keep your powder dry.
And, as always...feel better and Semper Fi!
John