(Rewriting this because my perspective has slightly changed)

Honestly, I don’t think there’s been a single moment in my life where I’ve felt connected to the human race.

As a cub, I never felt this connection at all. I barely felt connected to my family, watching cartoons with humans in them felt odd, and no matter what, I just couldn’t make friends with humans. I remember at family parties, I would even prefer to be in the room with the dogs in them instead of playing with my cousins. Being alone or being with animals was always my preference, I was always happiest at those times...not to mention how much I loved the outdoors and loved looking at nature even when I was a silly cub.

And then...ever since my day of awakening, the fateful day that a vision of my true self appeared in my mind...it all suddenly made sense.

Why I never got along with humans, why I was always so content with being alone, why I felt so deeply affected by nature compared to others, why I started feeling too stupid to understand subjects in school, why I never felt attraction to many human beings, why I never understood a lot of their culture, why my brain feels so different from everyone else’s, why I felt more at home in the midst of nature than in my own home surrounded by family.

Because I was never human in the first place.

And ever since coming to this conclusion...everything just suddenly feels right. So, now I’m playing catch-up. Letting myself live as my true self for as long as I live to make up for 20 years of living “human”

I believe I'm a therian for several reasons.

As long as I can remember, cats have been my "favorite animal". My family used to say I was obsessed with them. I remember this one memory of when I was very young, and we had these colored balloons with stickers. My favorite color at the time was pink, but that sticker was a pig. I always went with the light blue cat one. Every time.

When I was a bit older, or maybe even way back then, I used to say to my parents "I am a cat." This is long before I discovered therianthropy. I used to crawl around on the floor, meow (oh how I meowed) and generally act like a cat.

When I finally learned of therianthropy and TG, I knew immediately: this is me. This is who I am, this explains why I'm so strange, why I don't fit in.

I don't know. I was just born a human with a piece of animal in my body. I'd say that over time, the animal part was sculpted into a wolf form. But ever since I was a little girl, I've had a little dog in me. I had a tendency to growl when I was a kid, and I acted much more like an animal in general. Ever since I could walk, my mother says my favorite place to be was in the woods. I've been called a woodswoman by my friends. As I've gotten older, it's only become more apparent. I'm more intergrated with my wolf. Other people can tell, I have a different energy. Sometimes I just go to school and feel like I don't belong. It's like I'm completely different and I just fit in. I'm most excited about being alone in the woods, exploring all kinds of things or just sitting and enjoying the atmosphere. Also, needless to say, I have animal behavior and instincts and occasionally I have a shift.

well I can't really explain why, it just happens over a course of time for me in some case. I was never like into playing as a animal as a kid but overtime in secret I would be one mentally, Im sociable or not shy at all but in middle school and elementary school I was very quite. Now right now I don't have any proof it just fits.

I know I was born this way because even before I could really form any solid memories, my parents have home videos of me acting in animalistic ways and vocalizing. Now the point you raised about dialing down a specific theriotype is interesting and did get me thinking.

As a young pup, I wasn't super specific about identifying a specific animal. I was more generalized, though I often did gravitate towards wolf more than other animals except when reading a series like Warriors. Later on, after letting the animal part of me back into my life, I quickly identified as a wolf and nothing more (though went through a brief phase of questioning a second cat theriotype, but I was reading Warriors again). I really didn't conduct any sort of research because as an animal fanatic I already had sufficient knowledge to determine with certainty that I was a wolf, and I think the traits, urges, instincts, and what not are pretty easy to connect to wolves specifically, and it's the only thing that feels right. Looking back on it, wolf is the only thing that has ever felt right, or real. While I enjoyed acting as any type of animal as a pup, being a wolf has always had a deeper sort of feeling or meaning.

(2024-10-19 13:07)Lupus Ferox Wrote:  I thought yes, why can't it be shaped when I stumbled upon your post, although it's possibly more complicated than that. For instance, I knew I was canine for sure and therefore sought after animals under that same hood. While other animals (under that branche) had indeed crossed my mind before then, it wasn't until the wolf was introduced the idea that that should be me was the strongest. And that idea kind of lingered on since then. I'm not saying I changed theriotypes like underpants back at the very start, but switching between types can be meaningful sometimes in order to get to know yourself from all possible angles. (I had four possible theriotypes at the start, for your information!) I think it's okay to do proper research and to try out multiple types to see what gets closest to your skin. See what fits and what slides off of you... like the rain on a duck.
I'm just saying that you're born with a therian identity, but what you are, is likely to get clearer to you through experience and the life wisdom you'll gain through interaction with your world, the people in it and of course by putting your mind to the test. Is this too far-fetched?

It is not, no. I definitely agree with what you have to say here!

I thought yes, why can't it be shaped when I stumbled upon your post, although it's possibly more complicated than that. For instance, I knew I was canine for sure and therefore sought after animals under that same hood. While other animals (under that branche) had indeed crossed my mind before then, it wasn't until the wolf was introduced the idea that that should be me was the strongest. And that idea kind of lingered on since then. I'm not saying I changed theriotypes like underpants back at the very start, but switching between types can be meaningful sometimes in order to get to know yourself from all possible angles. (I had four possible theriotypes at the start, for your information!) I think it's okay to do proper research and to try out multiple types to see what gets closest to your skin. See what fits and what slides off of you... like the rain on a duck.
I'm just saying that you're born with a therian identity, but what you are, is likely to get clearer to you through experience and the life wisdom you'll gain through interaction with your world, the people in it and of course by putting your mind to the test. Is this too far-fetched?

Heya, I don't know if the title is a bit misleading or not, so if anyone has any name suggestions just shoot. It's 7 am and I haven't slept yet, lol. Anyways,

I was reading a newly published book this morning, digging into a lot of things, such to say the history of therisnthropy, an explanation to it, and the publishers personal experience... They spoke about how they found their theriotype, the iriomote cat... It got me thinking.

As Therians that are aware of their identity, are we truly born this way, knowing we for sure are our identity at some point, or can it be shaped?

I know for me, it's been a mixed bag as a shapeshifter with some identities thrown in there... For example, I've always known I was a timber Wolf. I've known since I first saw them in my area that I was one of them, even if in the flesh I was not. This experience was innate to me. However, there were other experiences that were not. Ones I had to do research on. Ones I saw and had a "Aha!" Moment. I wonder, if there were animals of very similar characteristics both physically and personality/behaviour wise, and I came across them first, would I have identified as them, instead of what I identify as now?

What if most of us were like that. We know we are something, and we know we have something of certain traits, but how are we so sure that it's one thing over another? Would it be possible for us as Therians to be torn in two over this? Does it come naturally?

By the way, this post isn't meant to be controversial at all. It's meant to provide a question to allow people to think about themselves for a moment. It's also aimed to create feedback, and create a space where we can talk about challenging things with ourselves.

I am on there and am apart of it but I do the videos for fun and info. I also make sure to inform every person I see that calls themselves a therian what it really is cause the definition has been so messed on there.