Going from permanent to rotational — what did you actually give up?

Fourteen years permanent, and I'm now seriously looking at 2:2. The obvious trade is money — the rotational jobs I'm seeing pay less per month than the permanent seat I'm in. What I want to know from people who've made the switch is what else changed. Did you lose influence on the boat? Does the handover eat your first week? And is the time at home as good as you imagined, or do you spend it waiting to go back?

Honest answer on the handover: yes, it eats time. Two days minimum if your opposite number is good, a week if they're not. Insist on an overlap in person — the boats that hand over by email are the ones where nothing gets done. You do lose some influence. Decisions get made when you're not there and you find out afterwards. That bothered me for about six months and then stopped. The time at home is only as good as you make it. The people who struggle are the ones who don't build a life ashore, and then spend four weeks bored.

The money gap is smaller than it looks once you count the leave you never actually take on a permanent boat. The thing nobody warns you about is that your opposite number's standards become yours. Vet them like you'd vet the boat.

Two years into 2:2 and I would not go back. The first rotation home was strange. The tenth felt like a life.