The term used after you get used to being at sea and the possibility of motion sickness goes away. Every time we left port I felt bad for a short period of time. Sometimes I was worse than others, but after a day or two I felt better. Then the motion never bothered me.

I will be honest I was worried about it because I had no idea if I would get sick or not and I did not want to be looked down on if I did get sick. We had guys who would hear, “Underway shift colors,” and they would start to puke.

Being down in the engine rooms it helped, since they did not move as far as the upper decks did. People who worked on the bridge, in combat, or radio had the worst time since they were sitting about 40 feet above the water and moved more than we did.

Getting your sea legs was something that every sailor had to do. No matter who you were you have to learn to deal with life on the ocean. We did have one new sailor who was sick 100% of the time and finally had to be flown over to the carrier. Once there he got worse. They had to fly him back to land so he could be taken care of. We ended up packing up his stuff and sending it back to shore. I never did hear what was wrong with him.

Sea legs are something a good sailor has. Not having them is bad, very bad.