Sorry, I can't reproduce this; if get_value() returns 'initializing', then the loop terminates immediately.

use warnings;
use strict;

my $cnt;
sub get_value { $cnt++ < 10 ? 'initializing' : 'ok' }

my $status;
while( !( ($status = get_value()) eq 'initializing' ) ) {
    print "X"
}
print "Y\n";
[download]

Just prints one Y.

Edit: This was posted before the root node was updated, see my reply here.