Laura blogs over at Laura’s Light. This post was originally posted on her blog on January 22, 2016.
I feel so lonely. And… I don’t know what to do.
Does a butterfly feel lonely in the cocoon? Or does it have butterfly conversion support group meetings?
I don’t know. But I wish I had them. I wish I had someone at my beck and call, people who would come whenever I needed them: to say hello or to just sit next to me and be. But it doesn’t work like that. People have their own lives, their own things going on. And they can’t always come. It feels like they can’t more often than not these days.
Or maybe I just don’t know how to ask.
I don’t. I know that. I don’t want to let myself need people, to not be ok.
But if we’re honest this butterfly has gone through a hell of a lot of shit this year. And she doesn’t know what to do. And she needs people. She just doesn’t know how to ask.
Eleanor Writes Things 
Dear Butterfly…. I wanted to reach over and help you, to pull you through, pull you out. I remembered this story.
“Once a little boy was playing outdoors and found a fascinating caterpillar. He carefully picked it up and took it home to show his mother. He asked his mother if he could keep it, and she said he could if he would take good care of it.
The little boy got a large jar from his mother and put plants to eat, and a stick to climb on, in the jar. Every day he watched the caterpillar and brought it new plants to eat.
One day the caterpillar climbed up the stick and started acting strangely. The boy worriedly called his mother who came and understood that the caterpillar was creating a cocoon. The mother explained to the boy how the caterpillar was going to go through a metamorphosis and become a butterfly.
The little boy was thrilled to hear about the changes his caterpillar would go through. He watched every day, waiting for the butterfly to emerge. One day it happened, a small hole appeared in the cocoon and the butterfly started to struggle to come out.
At first the boy was excited, but soon he became concerned. The butterfly was struggling so hard to get out! It looked like it couldn’t break free! It looked desperate! It looked like it was making no progress!
The boy was so concerned he decided to help. He ran to get scissors, and then walked back (because he had learned not to run with scissors…). He snipped the cocoon to make the hole bigger and the butterfly quickly emerged!
As the butterfly came out the boy was surprised. It had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. He continued to watch the butterfly expecting that, at any moment, the wings would dry out, enlarge and expand to support the swollen body. He knew that in time the body would shrink and the butterfly’s wings would expand.
But neither happened!
The butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings.
It never was able to fly…
As the boy tried to figure out what had gone wrong his mother took him to talk to a scientist from a local college. He learned that the butterfly was SUPPOSED to struggle. In fact, the butterfly’s struggle to push its way through the tiny opening of the cocoon pushes the fluid out of its body and into its wings. Without the struggle, the butterfly would never, ever fly. The boy’s good intentions hurt the butterfly.
keep in mind that struggling is an important part of any growth experience. In fact, it is the struggle that causes you to develop your ability to fly.”
I have learned in the darkest, loneliest places how much God loves me.
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I’m there too. I’ve lost my old world and haven’t grown a new one yet.
I keep telling myself that lovely days are coming. Spring will rise.
It doesn’t feel true. But I’ve decided to make it true, if I can.
That’s the future I choose.
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