Pitman is one of the few rotations that actually fits a custody cycle
Most shift patterns drift through the week and wreck any fixed arrangement. Pitman does not. It runs on a 14-day cycle — two on, two off, three on, then the mirror image — and 14 divides by seven, so your working days land on the same weekdays every fortnight. A two-week custody rotation repeats on precisely the same boundary. That is a genuinely rare bit of luck and it is worth building on deliberately.
The practical consequence: you can name the days. Not "the first two days of my off-block", which nobody can hold in their head, but "I have them from Wednesday evening to Saturday morning, every fortnight". That is a plan a child can recite and a co-parent can rely on.
| Days | Work | What it is good for |
|---|---|---|
| 1–2 | On | No custody time; arrange cover if these are your days |
| 3–4 | Off | A clean two-day block — the easiest custody window in the cycle |
| 5–7 | On | The three-day stretch. Treat day 8 as recovery, not as free |
| 8–9 | Off | Best used as recovery plus one solid day |
| 10–11 | On | Short block, minimal disruption |
| 12–14 | Off | The three-day off-block — this is your long weekend equivalent |
Build the custody blocks around days 12–14 and 3–4
Those are the two stretches where you are genuinely available and rested. The three-day off-block at the end of the cycle is the single most valuable piece of parenting time in the rotation, and it repeats reliably every fortnight. Anchor the schedule there first and fit everything else around it, rather than starting from a standard custody template and hoping it lands well.
The trap is day 8. It looks like an off day on paper — and it is — but it is the day after a three-day run, and if your rotation includes nights it is the day you are least useful to anybody. Plenty of shift-working parents claim it, then spend it asleep while their child watches television. Being honest about that day up front is not giving up time; it is not promising time you cannot deliver.
What to settle with your co-parent
Because the pattern is stable, most of these only have to be agreed once.
- Publish the fortnight as dates. Generate three months of real dates rather than describing the pattern. Nobody should have to compute day 12 in their head.
- Name the recovery rule. Something like "no handoff within eight hours of a night shift ending". A rule stops it being a request every cycle.
- Decide what happens when the rotation shifts. Rotations get adjusted. Agree how much notice you give and whether the custody blocks move with the shift or stay put.
- Handle holidays separately. A holiday landing in a working block is not a scheduling problem you can solve inside the rotation. It needs its own decision, made early.
Bottom line: Pitman repeats every 14 days and so does a fortnightly custody cycle, which means the two can be locked together instead of fighting. Anchor custody on days 12–14 and 3–4, treat the day after a long stretch as recovery rather than free time, and publish the whole thing as real dates.