A.O.T.D. (Animal of the Day) Monarch Butterfly

Well it's Spring and 'tis the season for renewal and rebirth. Of course what better to represent than with this insect beginning its life as a caterpillar and then making its metamorphosis into a beautiful butterfly.

I sort of feel like I'm stuck in a cocoon right now beginning to emerge as a renewed self. It's been quite an interesting past month. I broke and split open my nose in a diabetes related incident. I woke up one night with an incredibly low blood sugar. then proceeded to lose consciousness and have a seizure. Upon having this I fell and hit my face on the door frame and damaged my nose. This is not easy for me to think of or write about, but it isn't something I can just put aside and ignore (which I have done at times in the past). I've been a type 1, insulin dependent diabetic for 23 years now. Having it certainly includes some ups and downs, but regardless it's made me who I am for better and for worse. It was a painful lesson for me to learn not to take my diabetes for granted by any means, and to learn from this to improve my discipline and outlook towards it. I plan to live a long life with this and be as healthy as possible.

Luckily I have a wonderful person in my life to help me when I need it. I am now a married man, and am proud to say feels quite good. My wife and I are a true yin and yang relationship, as she is everything that I am not. This helps us compliment each other quite well. She's taught me to challenge my beliefs and outlook on life constantly and I believe I've grown tremendously from being with her. I am one who truly believes everything happens for a reason, and me meeting Sarah was meant to be.

I feel there's a more spiritual side developing in me as well. I've long been known by some to be a staunch atheist, but I'm beginning to wonder if times are changing. This does not by any means translate as me being a "born-again", in fact I do not and will never have any religious affiliation. Even through my years as an atheist, I held the belief that there was more to life than what we see, and that there was more to life after "death". Now this is what I believe or would like to believe, but ultimately I don't know what will happen at death and if a "god" will be there to greet me, and quite frankly nobody does. To clarify though, I'm not totally sure what I believe yet, but it's developing and more than anything I'm learning the benefits of having a spiritual side. Maybe this whole life as we know it is the caterpillar and cocoon stage, and once we "pass", our spirit is the butterfly?