I have been especially aware lately of some changes in my children that I can only compare to a butterfly as it comes out of its cocoon. When my children were younger we bought one of those butterfly habitats where you could watch the caterpillars spin their cocoons and eventually come out as a beautiful butterfly.
It was a pretty amazing experience and that’s exactly how I feel now as I become aware of changes in my children. In my 16-year-old son I am beginning to see a level of maturity that hadn’t been there before. In my 13-year-old daughter I am seeing a social emergence.
With my daughter it’s a much bigger deal to me. When she was younger she was so incredibly shy that it affected her relationship with family members. It was bad enough that she wouldn’t speak to acquaintances or even my own friends but she wouldn’t even talk to her own grandparents.
At first it was cute. As she began to get older it became more of a concern. Or should I say that it became more of a concern to those around me. But I felt she would eventually grow out of it.
She didn’t enter school until the 2nd grade as I had homeschooled her before that. I thought that school would help but it didn’t. Every year passed and by the time she was in 7th grade I was still hearing the same thing year after year at parent/teacher conferences, “She needs to speak up,” “She needs to contribute to class discussions.”
I guess eventually I came to accept that this is who she was. During these years, however, she has managed to maintain a couple of close relationships. She has grown up in the church with two friends in particular and for whatever reason would talk to them.
By the time she was ending her 7th grade year I started to notice her come out of her shell more and more. She began to step out of her comfort zone and do things she would normally not have ever done before. She also began to make more friends.
Now as I look back on her journey and I see how far she has come, I can only picture the beautiful butterfly emerging from its cocoon. That was what I saw in my mind this past week when I stopped into the gym at our church. Every Wednesday night we have youth group and she was walking around with a group of friends, laughing and talking.
Sometimes we get frustrated with our children. We become concerned about things we see in them. We worry what others will think. But our children are only beginning to develop and become the person they are meant to be.
Wait…wait for the cocoon to break open and that beautiful butterfly to emerge.
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