I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know Kim of Co-Pilot Mom, and I’m so glad I did. She is the lovely, funny, sweet mother of her two Captains who worked as an Early Childhood Educator and is now their stay at home mom. She is a regular iPPP-er, which we love, of course, and she has such a way of weaving little moments into profound, thoughtful stories. Her posts make me think and laugh and cry.

I’m so happy to introduce you to Kim today (or reintroduce you) and let her share her expectations.

Marlin On My Shoulder

Years ago, before we had children, my husband and I watched Finding Nemo.

I was always told that I am like Dory. I took it as a compliment, for other than some fairly significant memory issues, Dory is a pretty cool fish. Positive, brave and fun. “Just keep swimming” is more than a catchy little ditty; it is a life philosophy in itself. Dory: blue tang, philosopher.

I related to Dory – as much as a human *can* relate to a fictional anthropomorphized fish. She looked at the bright side, she was sweet, she looked out for others, and she loved her friends. (And she spoke whale – I mean, how cool is that?!) And she just keeps swimming.

Marlin, on the other hand, used to get on my nerves.

‘Dude,’ I would think, ‘let it go. Let him grow up.’

His protecting and sheltering of Nemo were over the top.

‘No way am I going to do that when I am a parent,’ I thought to myself.

Nope, I was going to be Team Dory all the way.

‘I won’t worry, it’ll all be fine, just keep swimming.’

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming…

I maintained the belief that I was like Dory throughout the years, until we recently watched Finding Nemo again one Saturday night.

Alpha was never really a fan, but it had been a while and I thought we could introduce Bravo to this classic tale of undersea adventure.

I was watching, all cuddled up on the love seat with my little fishies, when the realization washed over me:

I am not Dory anymore.

I have become Marlin.

I watched as Marlin fussed over Nemo – checking if he was OK, checking the dilation of Nemo’s pupils, worrying aloud about internal bleeding.

And I realized that he is not only dealing with the moment, but the horrifying possibilities of what might go wrong.

That is something I forgot about in my plans for a Dory-zen motherhood.

So much can happen. So much could happen.

There is so much worry.

So much of my heart swimming outside my body.

Out of my control.

So sometimes, I want to try to control. I try to control all of it.

But that is useless. Futile.

Like holding back the ocean.

I can’t do it.

But I can’t be Dory anymore, either. There is too much to lose now.

So I feel you, little orange dude. I didn’t understand before.

I keep Dory on my shoulder, still. She is there to remind me:

Enjoy the moment before it passes, have fun and laugh.

But Marlin is on my other shoulder now:

Take care, be safe, I’ll be right here.

He is there because I know now – now that I am a mom.

Follow Kim on her blog, Co-Pilot Mom, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.