Helena Ljungqvist and her partner Niklas Gustafsson met when they were working onboard, she as chief officer and he as chief engineer.  When she became pregnant, they decided that he would take a job ashore while she stayed on board.

“I only had three months left until my master’s qualification, so it felt like a wrong move to then work ashore,” she says. Niklas already had his qualification. 

At first she didn’t mention her pregnancy at work because she didn’t want to be treated differently and she had no difficulties managing her job, she explains. 

“I did my duties without any problems and no one noticed that I was pregnant.  In the fifth month, I informed the shipping company to give them time to find a replacement.  After that, I was suspended from my job on a pregnancy allowance from the Social Insurance Agency,” says Helena Ljungqvist.

When her daughter Vera was 13 months old, Helena set off on her first tour at sea as a parent. Leaving the family at home was not quite as tough as she had imagined, even though it was difficult. 

I think it’s even more difficult for the parent who stays at home.

“Of course, it was hard to leave and I miss Niklas and Vera when I’m away, but I think it’s even more difficult for the parent who stays at home. I can’t hear Vera screaming for me when it’s time for bed, Niklas has to take that. When I’m at home, I try to compensate by buying all the food, having the car inspected and things like that, but Niklas feels it’s hard when I’m away and we don’t get any real family life together.”

Helena continued to work on tanker ships for a while after she had the baby, but the irregular signing-on and off became too complicated. Since last spring she has worked as chief officer at a new cargo shipping company called Lakeway Link, where she has three-week tours and fixed changeover days. 

“It works out much better. Niklas works as fleet manager at a shipping company in Stockholm and he needs to know whether he can attend that meeting on Thursday or not.” 

In terms of the work environment, Helena thinks working on board and having a child and partner is fine, but she admits she is fairly worn out during the first few days at home. Their daughter’s nursery in Solna, just outside Stockholm where the family lives, allows Vera to be there when Helena is at home, which gives her time to recover. Being able to have your child at a nursery when both parents are at home on an allowance is not always the case; the rules vary between different municipalities and nurseries. 

“I have friends who work at sea whose nurseries won’t let the children be there when they’re at home.  Of course, you want to be with your child, but you also need to recover. It would be good to have the same rules everywhere, because it is a bit random at the moment depending on where you live.”  

In general, she thinks that more needs to be done to make it easier for seafarers with young children.

“There’s a lot of talk about encouraging more women to work in shipping, but it doesn’t feel like this industry is really adapted to it,  and it doesn’t only apply to women – men also want to be at home with their children. But I quite understand that not everything can be changed and I have chosen this profession myself and enjoy it very much.”