A career ruined by a sneeze?

Mat's been waiting to start his training in the army for a year now. The main reason is that he needed to have an operation to fix his torn right eardrum before he could start. The operation was put off a few times, and finally it was done last Thursday. When he got out, still stoned from the anaesthesia, they gave him a paper saying no physical exertion, no blowing his nose, no holding his nose if he sneezes, put a cotton ball with vaseline in his ear if he takes a shower, and no wearing earplugs, for 2 MONTHS. Well today he finally got his ps3 for his birthday, but his happiness was severely dampened by the fact that he forgot to not hold his nose when he sneezed (it's a habit of his) and heard a tearing noise in his ear. So now he's freaking out thinking he tore his eardrum and won't be able to join the army. He left a message at the clinic but they haven't called back yet. Of course it's not 100% sure, it wasn't even sure that the operation would be a success in the first place, but still. I'm ambivalent about the situation, on one hand if he's not in the army there are better chances that I won't have to raise our kids alone because of his job, and he won't be running off to get killed in another country. But at the same time I know he sees this as a somewhat last-ditch attempt at a career for him since he doesn't have a high school diploma. Yesterday on the phone his dad (maybe jokingly?) suggested that he go work up north in James Bay at the mines, that it was good money. When I heard that I looked at him with an expression like "whaaaat!?!" but after thinking about it for a second I don't think it would be that bad... we'd be out of the city finally, and at least we wouldn't be shlepped around every few years by the army. I don't know how seriously he'd consider going back to school if he doesn't end up joining the army, I'll ask him tonight. I'm just really eager to have some news from the clinic to see if we still have to wait the remaining 1 month and 3 weeks to find out if his eardrum really is torn or not.