How do I deal with loneliness from working away from home for months?

The work you can prepare for. The missing is harder. Months away from everyone you love is a different kind of hard, the kind no training toughens you against. That loneliness is not weakness. It is love with nowhere to go for a while. Give it somewhere to go. Keep a rhythm with home: a message sent at the same time, a letter, a photo you look at on the worst nights. Small rituals shrink the distance. And let yourself build real connection with the crew around you. They are far from home too. Shared solitude is lighter than solitude alone. Remind yourself why you go. Most people at sea are out there for people they love back on land. The distance is not the absence of that love, it is the cost of providing it. That does not make the nights easy, but it can make them mean something. You are not lost out there. You are away, and away has an end.