Say the thing. Nobody up top needs to know it was you.

Told the rotation was 3:1 at interview by xxxxxxxxxxxxxx. Nine months in and I have had eleven days off. When I asked, xxxxxxxxxxx said I should be grateful for the boat I am on. I have the email where it was promised. Apparently that counts for nothing once you are already aboard and your flights are booked.

We ran xxxxxxxxx for six weeks knowing the xxxxxxxxxxxx was not right. Everyone knew. Nobody wrote it down, because writing it down is how you do not get asked back. If it had let go with guests aboard, the paperwork would have been immaculate and one of us would have been the reason why.

xxxxxxxxxxxxx screamed at our chef over a lunch that ran late because xxxxxxxxxx changed the plan twice in an hour. He said nothing, plated it, served it, went below and shook. Twenty two years in galleys and he was spoken to like he had stolen something. Not one person above him said a word.

Told xxxxxxxxxxx I was struggling. Two days later my schedule was restructured and I was suddenly on every night watch. Nobody said the two were connected. They did not have to. Every person on board understood exactly what had happened, and not one of us will ever say we are struggling again.

We are told this is a family. Families do not hold your final month of wages until you sign a document promising never to describe what happened aboard. I signed it because rent does not wait. That is not a family, that is leverage, and a frightening amount of this industry runs on exactly that.

xxxxxxxxxxxx is the best I have ever worked with and she is coming apart in front of all of us. Sixteen hour days, no support, and the answer from xxxxxxxxxx was to send another green stew for her to train. She cannot say she is drowning, because saying it makes her the problem.

A crew member left the boat under circumstances nobody will name. The briefing we got was about the revised schedule. Not one sentence about him. Not one question about how any of us were doing. Two days later a memo arrived asking us to be mindful of what we post online. That was the entire response.

Third season and I am still introduced to guests as one of the girls. I hold certificates that xxxxxxxxx does not hold. The tip envelope splits on rank and I carry the work of the two people above me. Say a word about it and you are difficult, and difficult crew do not get the reference.

Asked about the extra hours through the yard period and was told the salary is all inclusive. I worked it out properly: roughly the minimum wage of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, before you account for the fact that I could not leave. They call it a lifestyle, as though the sunsets are going into my account.

Best crew I have ever worked with and I am leaving anyway. That is the part that gets me. It is not the work. It has never been the work. It is knowing that in ten years I will still be explaining to people ashore why the best year of my life is also the one I could not survive twice.

Every person on this boat is exhausted and every person says they are fine, because the first one to say otherwise becomes the weak link and quietly does not get asked back. We are all lying to each other inside a small metal building for nine months at a time and calling it professionalism.

I am the one the whole crew vents to. Two people this season have told me things I have not been able to stop thinking about since. There is nowhere for me to put any of it. No training, no support, and xxxxxxxxxxx thinks morale is fine, because keeping it fine is apparently my job now.

The reference system is a leash and everybody knows it. One line from xxxxxxxxxx ends a career, with no appeal, no HR, and nobody anywhere checking whether a word of it was true. That is precisely why nothing here ever changes, and why every one of these will stay anonymous forever.

First season. Nobody warned me that the hardest part is not the work, it is going from twelve people who are your entire world back to a bedroom at xxxxxxxxxxxxx with nobody who understands a word of it. I have never felt more alone than the fortnight after my best ever season ended.

The rotation I was promised has now been cancelled twice. I have missed xxxxxxxxxxxx and xxxxxxxxxxxxxx. The reply was that this is the nature of the industry and that I knew what I was signing up for. I did not sign up to be lied to at interview, which is a different thing entirely.

I would recommend this life to a friend and warn them off it in the same breath, and not once has anyone with the power to change anything asked me to explain that contradiction. Everyone quotes the number who love it. Nobody wants to hear from those of us who love it and are not okay.