Loving to fly when you go to the airport as a student, go up for a two hour flight, and then go home to your own house with your own wife is a world of difference from the airline lifestyle. One can almost say its one of the biggest bait and switches ever pulled on a person.

Flying in college was one of the most fun times I've ever had, but then regional FO flying became a drag. The difference? Even though I had many 10 hour days as a CFI, I got to go home and recharge at the end of the day. You really have no clue what the flying lifestyle holds until you've invested it all, only to "make it" and feel that you're wasting your life away every night in a hotel.

If you want to simulate this life to test it, go fly 8 legs (make sure you give about 45 min between them too) on MS Flight Sim, then when you finish, go lock yourself in a large closet. You can only call people from the closet, seeing them is cheating. Now repeat the process for the next 3 days. Only then can you come out of the closet and back "home" to all your spoiled food that spoiled earlier in the week. Then maybe you'll realize just how much time a long trip really eats up of your life.