Unexpected Butterfly

Today’s meltdown…

I was spraying the weeds in our yard. I rounded the corner of the house to see a butterfly on a dandelion.  Butterflies always remind me of Michaela. She loved them and felt it is was a good symbol for being transgender. 

When she taking her last breaths, I told her it was okay to fly free. 

“Fly, my beautiful butterfly, fly” 

I wanted her free from pain. Free from the cancer. 

I truly wanted that for her, but I also wish she was still here with me. I go through all the stages of grief - working through one and circling back to it again later as grief isn’t linear or laid out in a simple neat pattern.  I know this feeling I have is a normal part of grief. I often feel anger towards myself for not being able to save her. It isn’t logical, as I am not a doctor, but I just wish I could have done something to save her. 

Which is why I had a meltdown spraying weeds. When I saw the butterfly on the dandelion, I turned and went the other direction.  When I turned around again, the butterfly had followed me and landed on a weed I had just sprayed. I started crying because I thought I have given that butterfly a death sentence with the weed killer.  Which is more than likely. It didn’t matter to me in that moment that butterflies have short life spans, it didn’t matter that it probably didn’t actually land on the weed was sprayed.  All I could think was, “I can’t save this butterfly either.” 

Grief hits in these ways I never thought about. You think grief is just a general sadness of losing someone you love. Grief though comes in waves so strong they toss you in the ocean of feelings, it is like a pebble in my shoe that pushes at me with each step, it comes at you on the common anniversaries and also in the most unexpected times. Logic plays no part in grief, because even in those times you expect to be hit, something in it is unexpected. 

I had to stop my yard work and cry because I couldn’t save my butterfly.