The Chimeras' Log

Description: A gray therian has a full body phantom shift while at school.
Date First Written : January 2008

My psychology teacher talked, giving his lecture on human behavior. At times he quoted the class psychology book, while at other times he spoke from his own memory of the subject of the day. The whole class was relatively quite. No one really spoke apart from the teacher. The only common sounds in the classroom were faint ones just audible though very quite. The quiet sound of pencils scraping against paper as people -myself included- wrote down notes on what was being said by the teacher; the quite moan and groan from old wooded and metal desks creaking as people shifted in their seats; of the sound of the rubber bottoms of shoes sliding lazily against the concrete floor; and other random everyday sounds of a high school classroom.

I sat at my desk near the back in one of the outside rows, quietly listening as usual. I found psychology really pretty festinating actually and the teacher we had was actually pretty good. I loved to the hear the theories and brake-down of behavior and mind-set plus the concepts that explained how the brain worked and why and how we dreamed. A lot of things about psychology I liked. It often made me wonder in amusement and interest what some of the psychologists we read about would think of part of my identification let alone other people like me. Course, from what I had heard, a few small studies had occurred on very small scales but nothing that big from what I had heard anywhere in my few years around the communities related to my identification.

This part of my identity was much more then just a belief or perception for me. It was fact of my life, which I lived with every day and every moment no matter what, for better and for worse. Something that was as much a part of me as much as I could possibly imagine. This was such a strong part of my identity and my daily experiences that in some ways it was as much a of me as anything physical about me. It was very deeply embedded and nestled within my very heart and soul as far as I was concerned even at this point in my life after feeling this way sense I was a child. This part of my identity was the fact that - though I was fully and complete human physically - my heart, mind, and even what I thought of as my soul told me without dough that my inner self was that of a wolf.  I didn’t know how or why I was the way I was. Whether it was because it was from reincarnation and that I had been a gray wolf in a past life, or whether it was because I had somehow strongly imprinted in some way with wolves and other canines at a very young age, or whether it was because I some kind of naturally occurring brain abnormality; or some other cause all together I didn‘t know. I didn’t really care actually, because I was myself regardless if I ever knew that fact or not.

I shifted my weight so all my weight was focused more on one side of my hip. I did not like sitting in these desks at times like that. It was times like this that the desks was uncomfortable then. Not that they were any more or less comfortable any other time, but simply more uncomfortable at this point. I had a nagging pitched or pulled pain that was almost like the pain one gets when one’s arm is being pulled back onto one’s own back. I shifted my weight around again, trying to find a better position that might provide me with some kind of relief from my discomfort.

What was accruing was my tail, phantom though it was, had become very solid in how I was feeling it much more so than usual when I had a phantom tail. My ghost of a tail had been a near constant silent companion to me along with my phantom ears for quite a while now anymore, but at this time the feelings had been increased up. Other phantoms that I experienced like a muzzle or fur came and went for hours to days, but my spectral wolf ears and tail always stayed. They were a fact of my every day life. Sometimes they were weak and very ghost-like with being more detached in there reality to me, while at other times my phantom limbs were so solid in feel that if I didn’t know better I might feel the urge to double check to make sure that they were not actually really there somehow.

Today was one of those days when my phantom tail had became even more intense than usual and felt very solid to me. Even though I knew very well my phantom limbs were all in my mind it never made the discomfort of sitting in a hard desk with a tail sticking out of one’s tailbone and getting cramped up against me any easier at all.    

I set my pencil down on my paper for a moment as I shifted my weight even more off to the side, before finally finding the relief I had been seeking for my phantom tail. My tail lay curled around beside me in my seat on my left side. Three or four years of experience had taught me that not only was this method more comfortable it was also safer. The reason being that line of thinking was that: not only could my phantom limbs feel very ghostly or solid, they could also react like they were ghostly or solid. When my phantoms reacted ghostly they would pass through anything like a ghost and there would be no real sensation on my part apart from the presence of the limb itself. When my phantom felt very solid to me they would act like they were really there and they would not pass through solid objects. Instead could feel the confinement and such as thought it was actually there. The cause of my safely measure had come about after a classmate who had sat behind me in Spanish class a few years ago had kicked the back of my chair and had hit my tail dead-on. The pain that had shot up my spine was similar to that of someone had actually kicked me. After that I had taken care to protect my phantom limbs as much as I did any of my real limbs. 

Once our teacher started on information I felt I wanted to write down again, I quickly picked up my pencil and begun to take notes once more. My ears twitched and turned, without forethought from me, with my every thought and emotion. They would perk-up more, then slant backward, then return to normal, then move ever so slightly this way or that. That was how it always was though I hardly noticed my ears movement at any time unless I was actively noting it because it was so second nature.

My tail mostly lay motionless beside me apart from the occasional slow, slight wag of the tip of my tail for one reason or another at times. Usually, like my ears, my phantoms acted without my willful thought making them move less I really needed them to move. My ears and tail moved like any other body part – without any effect on my conscious mind for it was all a natural motion. By the way my phantoms reacted to things around me and how I reacted to them they might as well been physically real. They were real enough to me, real enough not to be imaging them. My phantom limbs were real enough even though they were not physically there.

The boy beside me raised his hand to ask a question. The teacher quickly stopped to call on him and answer him. My phantom ears came forward with sudden acute interest as the teacher’s answer spawned my own question. I consciously made my tail wag once, for my own amusement. The teacher quickly answered my question and went back to this lecture. My curiosity satisfied, my ears relaxed back to there normal position.

At that time my psychology teacher called that that was enough for the day and retired to his desk. I glanced at the wall clock to see that we only had about two minutes left. I placed my papers back in my large binder and put my pencil into the pouch which was snapped into my binder. I got my things set up to rush out the door as soon as the bell rang due to the fact that I had to make it across the campus to get to my next class which would be Chemistry.

With everything ready to go I relaxed back into my seat, waiting for the bell to ring. As I sat I let my mind wander in random thought. I thought about my English assignment that was due after lunch. I wondered if the weather was going to be nice after school in hopes of being able to go to the park for a while or if there was any possibility of going camping this fall. At the thought of camping it brought back a passing thought that caused my phantom ears twitched and folded back slightly in response. I was part of the therian community online and I had been sense I was fifteen. Now that I had my own car and I was a senior in high school my parents were a lot easier on me. There were a few people that lived in my rough area that I had been talking to off and on for a while. One of those therians that lived in a city just an hour away from me, a cougar who was a few years older then me and was already in their second year of college, was pretty cool. He and I had already had a number of mini-hangouts already over the year, and we actually had a fair lot in common besides just being therians. Us and a few others had been playing the idea of having a gather, or “howl,” in the next few months. The idea of seeing Purring Joe (his username and his real name was Joe), the cougar therian again plus the idea of seeing other therians while going camping made my phantom tail wag. That would be fun for sure.

As I sat there waiting up till that last few seconds of class I then randomly had an image come to mind. The image of how I see myself as a gray wolf - a regular mixed gray and some pale tan coat. The first mental image was myself as a gray wolf with a pack in a snowy open plain, but the second mental image was of myself as a gray wolf sitting as I was right then and there. Of a gray wolf having to sit down in the seat that I was sitting in. Hindquarters sitting in the seat with tail slightly draped around the side with front paws laying up along the desk.

My mind locked on the ‘feel’ of my theriotype being in the place of my physical human body. It was now around me in my senses and feelings. I felt the numb and disembodied presence of a phantom sensation come around me, but it was not just ears, tail, or muzzle; it was everything else as well. My full wolf body was my phantom sensation. My whole physical human body was shadowed by a phantom wolf body.

I slowly glanced about the room calmly, feeling my phantom wolf head turn along with my physical human head in the same space as my physical body. My phantom wolf body sat on its – my? – haunches in my seat. My right arm lay in my lap and my left one lay on the desk beside my book and folder. Similarly, my phantom wolf body appeared to be trying to mimic and match my physical body as best I could. My right foreleg set upright on the seat of the desk supporting my weight while my left foreleg lay on my desk table. My phantom body was trying to do what my physical body was doing to the best of what my brain thought wolf anatomy would allow.

I felt my muzzle in front of my face and the fur that covered my phantom body. I still felt my tail curled beside me and my ears on my head but now they were a part of a full body. I did not just have phantom limbs now; I now had a phantom body. A phantom apparition that was me sitting in the same space as my physical body. My phantom wolf body was sitting fully like a wolf in a school desk that was uncomfortable for a human body any day of the year and even more so for a wolf.

Despite that, I liked it. I liked the feel of my phantom wolf body being there over me. I had had full wolf body phantoms before, though very rarely. Though having a phantom wolf body was always a bit odd and even awkward at times.

With acute questioning interest I lifted my arm off the table slightly only to feel my front leg mimic it. My phantom ears twitched forward and the corners of my phantom muzzle’s lips slightly to brake-out into a wolf-like grin. I laid my arm down then and set my other arm on the desk beside it, my phantom limbs acting accordingly. I was so easily amused at times indeed.

At that moment, the bell let out its sudden shrill ring at that moment signaling the end of the hour causing my ears to perk-up in attention. There was a rush of sound: books closing, shoes pushing against the floor, books sliding off the desks, people beginning to talk to one another, and so on as the all headed for the door.

Automatically I physically stood up from my desk, my folder and math book held propped up at my chest. However my phantom body landed on all fours to the ground in my place. I felt my wolf body standing straight where I was along with feeling my physical body. I felt all four paws against cold, hard, smooth concrete besides just the feel of my real two feet surrounded by the warm confinement of my own shoes and the pressure of gravity against the soles of my feet.

Without missing a beat I began to walk for the door. To anyone else I was just a normal teenage guy, as they didn’t know the feelings that I felt daily and certainly didn’t know of the sensations I felt now right now walking both as a human and a wolf out with them out of the classroom. They did not know of this feeling of a ghost-like wolf body walking within my step nor the feeling my every day phantom tail sticking out of my butt and the phantom ears on top of my head otherwise either. Life really was weird that way.

My phantom wolf head was not with my own head but down low to the ground in a natural position for a gray wolf. I felt my wolf muzzle open slightly in light pant as all six of my legs – two real, four phantom – walked out the door and into the hallway of the school. I felt the motion of my phantom wolf legs walking with perfect pace with my body but in a different sync. I had lost my regular phantom tail that felt like it came out of my tailbone and now only had the phantom tail that was attached to my phantom wolf body. Said tail now wagged slightly as I walked down the halls to my next class. I was enjoying this feeling indeed.

I could feel people pass me, not just with my physical body but with my phantom body as well. I could feel their presence as much with my wolf body as I could with my human one. When people brushed up against my shoulder or arm as we all tried to hurried to our next class in the packed hallway, I could even feel there legs bush up against my wolf body. Their real bodies rumbling against that thick wolf fur along my phantom body. As I walked briskly down the hall avoiding groups of people standing still or walking too slowly for my pace I felt my wolf body do the same.

As I moved I felt my dull claws at the tip of my wolf body’s paws gently tap and scrape against the marble surface of the school floor. I even slightly felt the slight bounce and shift of my body fur as I quickly walked. My wolf head turned with my physical one as I kept looking around for the best way to get through as the people around me did the same.

In my own mind it felt like my brain was working double time. Processing the movements of my physical body as well as processing the movements of my phantom body. Feelings and sensations from both  having to be worked out. It felt like my balance was all over the place, even though more than likely to the outside world my balance seemed fine and normal. I even falsely ‘saw’ what it would be like if my real eyes were where the eyes of my phantom wolf body were right then. Looking about with being almost level with people’s thighs. I felt a bit awkward to me, but the rest of the experience I was enjoying to much to care about that.

As I turned a corner and headed straight for the door into my Chemistry classroom, my wolf self padding along with me as it had after sitting up at the end of my last class. I walked into the classroom and made my way quickly to my usual seat as my classmates were also coming in and finding their usual seats as well. As I slid sideways into my seat I felt my phantom self hopping onto the cold, plastic seat and sit down to mimic me. I felt wolf front paws resting on the top of the desk while my hindquarters rested against the back of the chair as I rest down my folder and book. A moment later the bell rang signaling the beginning of the class. 

Date First Written : September 2012

Deer equates to prey. Or at least that is the idea of many have immediately upon the consideration of what deer are. Deer of any species are often a source of food for a number of other animals in the world either directly by hunting them or by scavenging. Other animals depend upon the existence of various deer species that live in the same habitat with them. In many areas, if deer disappeared many large predators would starve due to lack of other large animals to eat. Yet, there is something people often forget too easily. The fact that deer are not prey. At least, not without calcification of events. A deer becomes prey, rather than are always just prey.

Prey is only something that happens when one messes up or luck is not in your favor. Wild deer have their own lives and do not live to just be eaten. They live for their own kinds existence and to continue on with their species. Animals adapt and live together and against each other. No animal is better than the other and each lives to live in whichever way possible for them. A simple fact of nature is that any animal can become prey to another really given the right events. The nature and traits of a deer are for their own survival and deer did not evolve as they have because they are prey but rather they evolved as they have to avoid being prey. The wariness and sensitive nature of the deer is meant to keep them alive.

As a deer therianthrope, these are just some of the awkward instincts that come into my mind. I have found that there is an interesting conflict in being a deer, and that is what I can best describe as the mix of two powerful feelings - wariness and curiosity. The wariness of a deer is perhaps the most apparent to many people who have watched deer. The ready nature of a deer to move and react in some way or form in a moment, even if the reaction  may not be needed or be executed in a way that could have been done better. The curiosity of deer is to keep watchful eyes open and take note the around them. To inquire on what is going on around them and so to better react. Curiosity and wariness compliant each other for deer, but for a deer in human form the mix of two instincts can lead to awkward situations. Such as spooking from sudden movement or sounds often leading to awkward situations because I am a deer in a human body. Such wary instincts do not often work like they are supposed to for a deer in the mold of human society. The human species is a social predator and so the human species are not one to be as conditioned by the lives of those that came before them to be as wary of possible danger. Such is the nature of many predators and even more so is the nature of domestication into human society.

The deer that are seen on hunting and outdoor shirts and posters are not really how deer are. Just like many species of animals, deer are plagued with over romanticism of traits that human beings see as admirable while outright ignoring less ‘glamorous’ facts of life for deer.  My instincts and behaviors as a deer is not just about fleeing from possible danger or standing as majestically as possible. My instincts are filled with in instincts to graze on plant-life when I see healthy lush plants such as grass and clover, the instinct to kneel down to drink when I see bodies of water, to be with others of my kind, to use my awareness and remain alert to what my senses are bringing in, wanting to find a safe place to settle down and chew my cud, and many more little things. My nature as being a deer in a human body is more then just one small aspect of a deer’s overall life and behavior. All animals are complex living organisms with a wide verity of behaviors.

As a deer therian in the therianthropy community I am tried of being called food. When I speak that I am a deer therian, what I can sometimes receive back are comments about that deer are tasty or being given teasing jokes of promising not to hunt me. I might be a deer in a human body but I am still human and if you seriously consider me food then I implore you to seek psychiatric help. And for that matter if I were physically a deer and the other their own species, a healthy deer can often outrun a number of other animals out to hunt them and even when cornered they can easily be killed by a good kick or stomp. If I bring up not liking being called prey and bring up that deer are not prey I have been waved off as not being able to take a joke. I hardly find calling someone their food a joke. 

Perhaps I am not surprised that how few non-carnivore theriotype therians don’t stick around long at all. Sometimes I think, if you do not know why, simply look at what comes out of some people’s mouths sometimes. Teasing and playful jokes thought to be innocent and made in fun are often not such by the person the receiving end. Perhaps to the gray wolf therians that I meet I should exclaim how I love watching wolves being hunted by airplane or being killed for someone’s exotic stake; or to the dog therians speak of how some countries eat dog and my interest in trying it one day. Those statements might be lies coming from me and I am sicken to any such thoughts, but such statements are allowed to be said to deer therians by others.

Some might exclaim that deer are often hunted unlike some other animals, yet remember - any animal can become prey to another animal if the opportunity arises to another. Wolves have been seen hunting down foxes and wolves will kill and eat other wolves if the opportunity arises. Carnivores may eat plant material if given the right place and need, even if it is not dire and likewise; and even herbivores have been known to eat meat-material as well. And regardless of this, how socially awkward do you think to feels herbivore therians to be called food to other therians? Treated like a piece of meat literally? Truly t is tiresome and straining. I’ve been asked if being around carnivore therians makes me feel uncomfortable. Thinking about it, I sometimes have to say yes but not because of what they are but what they constantly say and mention to me personally. A real life deer does not always flee in terror at the sight of another animal.

I am a deer in a human body. I do not “prey” in a human body. I see myself as a deer; not as a product of what others may take me for. The body, instinct, and nature of the various species of deer is where my identity resides.

Further driving a wedge between my identity and another therian’s is the difference in nature between a number of herbivores and a number of carnivores. A lot of people don’t seem to get therians over all, but even within therianthropy the subgroups can’t seem to fully get the others. How can a number of land-based therians ever fully sympathize with any number of water-dwelling therian nor sky-flying therians. Herbivore not fully understanding carnivore, extinct therians to extant ones. Some experiences can be similar but others are as alien as ever to the other. I can’t image the instincts that drive some therians to want to hunt and chase let alone eat raw flesh of another; but in the same token, I doubt few therians could imagine my instincts for complete awareness of my surroundings and alertness nor my strong desire to graze.

Neither are wrong nor lesser. Just different. We are all different, and we are all therians as the word therian include all animals large and small. Therians come in many different theriotypes, and deer therians are part that. Deer therians are a part of the community as much as any kind of theriotypes. We should all be respected.

- Pantairin

Date First Written: January 2012

Being humanoid in form doesn’t make someone anymore ‘human’ than other otherkin. Visual similarities aside there is often, for some kintypes, little resemblance otherwise between ‘human’ and a creature that is ‘humanoid but still nonhuman’ once you think about it. An angel might stereotypically look like just a human with wings, but that doesn’t make them so nor is a faun just like a human because they happen to look human from the waist-up more or less. The same is true for elves, mermaids, fae, and other possible kintypes that look human-like either just a little bit or lot more. They are still not human, and the otherkin who identity as any of them are not any less of an otherkin for it. Similar doesn’t make same as.

Even otherkin that are rather humanoid can have their own experiences with phantom limbs that don‘t fit a human template, natural instincts and longings not ‘normal’ for humans, mental dissonance from human behavior or society, a desire for nature in some form or another, and basically everything else more bestial otherkin and therians can and do experience. That feeling/sense of not being human, of not being in the right body, the sense of being ‘other,’ experiences ‘normal’ humans don’t seem to have - is still there. Just because someone’s kintype is more humanoid doesn’t automatically mean their otherkinness is necessarily any easier than someone whose kintype is not as humanoid in the least.
 
These more humanoid in kintype otherkin are often seemingly seen as more ‘human-like’ not only in appearance but also behavior then other otherkin sometimes. But a person can’t look at a person’s kintype and assume how their nonhuman identity effects them personally let alone what experiences such an identity does to them. Just because a person’s kintype looks humanoid doesn’t mean their kintype acts human or have instincts or mindsets not exactly or at all like something human. Some otherkin like mermaids, harpies, or fauns might even have experiences one might except from the animals their kintype has apparent traits of (phantom limbs, desires and longs for the outdoors, certain instincts and drives, and so on); while otherkin like dryads might experience things unlike any terrestrial animal (including humans). For other otherkin the difference has a lot more to do with the world around them then their physical body. A stereotype of this might be the elves, who pick-up on cultural and society differences more, or at that’s what I’ve seen from my perceptive. Then again, some humanoid otherkin might not. Some otherkin might not deal with or experience anything as dramatically or strikingly as others might, but even people of the same kintype can have very different experiences.

I’ve personally seen various forms of humanoid otherkin criticism or magnetization from other otherkin and also from a number of therians as well. It comes in shades from just not thinking they have as much to contribute or can’t understand the problems ‘less human’ otherkin face to outright criticism that they are of varying degrees of posers or people wrapped up in fantasies.

I’m not human. My body might be fairly humanoid from the waist up but the similarities end there. The lower half of me is most definitely not human. Humans don’t have sharp teeth, big animal-like pointed ears, and certainly not a furry tail or legs like a dog. That certainly isn’t human at all. That is just my nonhuman appearance, not to mention my nonhuman experiences. The siren’s call away from human society and into any place more fitting for the word ’wilderness’ telling in me. Some of my behavioral quirks are to want to whine, growl, hiss, snarl, yip, and all sorts of other noises that want to slip out if would let them. When fronting, I almost always get phantom legs over our physical human ones, plus my phantom ears and little tail are hard to miss. I also get my own brand of a kind of mental shift but they seem to be a bit different from how most therians seem experience them. They have a similar in animistic instinctive drive and reaction but I don’t loose the complex thinking of something more human-like even when they are very intense.

In the end, the biggest and most important similarity and connection a humanoid otherkin and a bestial otherkin have in common is that neither of them identity as being human or look at the world like a human does necessarily. Kintype appearances run all over the place and experiences even with the ’same kintype’ can have huge differences. That is why otherkin have come together in one for or another over the past few decades - to share experiences and stories, talk about the amusing things in life, share coping mechanisms, and then some. We identity as nonhuman and that is some commonality that can be certainly talked about.

- Lunatani

Date First Written: July 2011

Cladotherianthropy is not a topic that is often discussed nor is it a term often known by to many within of the community. This is because  it is not a commonplace phenomenon to many therians; however, it is not unheard of nor unique. However, because it is a little used term, likewise cladotherianthropy is rarely brought-up outside those who identify as such and questions about that the term means for those unaware. Plus, outside of the general definition, little much is known or thought about the label. Few know who, when, or where the term came from for instance.

The word, cladotherian comes from the Greek word klados meaning “branch” and therion meaning “animal.” The klados prefix was originally chosen by its creator because in scientific terms, a clade is a grouping of an organism and all its descendants. It is referred to as a clade in reference to the “tree of life” which is formed in diagrams showing the connections between species over millennia due to distant with modification - one line of linage being merely a branch on the tree. The word clado was also chosen because the word cladistics meaning the modern taxonomic method of classifying organisms according to evolutionary relationship between them.

Likewise, a cladotherian is someone who’s theriotype is neither a single distinct species nor is it many separate animals like those who are polytherians (those who two or more theriotypes). Rather, a cladotherian’s theriotype is the general essence or spirit of all animals within a given taxa, meaning a grouping of organisms within a taxonomic rank (within a genus, family, order and so on) or similar. For example, cladotherians identifying with the genus Ursus alone, would identify with bears within that category including the American Black Bear, the Brown Bear,  Polar Bear, the Asiatic Black Bear, and a few other species. However, a cladotherian identifying with the family Ursidae -of which Ursus includes- it would include a much larger and wide range of species including sun bears, sloth bears, the extinct short-faced bear, spectacled bears, the giant panda, and others. However, cladotherianthropy does not mean that a therian is still searching for a specific species nor have they just not been able to narrow down from a family or genus to a species.

The term is far from new, however it unknown to my knowledge exactly where or when the label was spawned. However, the term appears on many of the oldest threads on the Awareness Forums, a now inactive forum which is one of the oldest still standing therian forums at this point in time. Credit to creating the term goes to one user by the calling Mokele who used ihe term themselves and identified as a reptile cladotherian. The existence of the term on the forum goes as far back to the year to 2003 in September which when the Awareness forums was created making it likely the term existed even before then.

Commonly considered for the term within the therian community are groupings of animals of a certain genus or family categories; however, given the fluidity of the term it has been used for an even broader since to include an order or even class. The latter cases are not as common and are the subject of some of the concerns for the term being used in such broad fashions.

Cladotherianthropy is different from polytherianthropy in the nature that a polytherian has multiple, usually two or three but sometimes slightly higher, theriotypes while a cladotherian doesn’t. A cladotherians theriotype is not many or several separate species from the same grouping but rather simply the whole grouping itself. A polytherian may have several theriotypes of completely different animals or they may be of similar species, however the latter individual may still be simply a polytherian rather than a cladotherian. A polytherian can be both a tiger, a lion, and a leopard therian; however that wound not make them a cladotherian for the genus panthera by its definition less they identified with all the animals in panthera.

There are several longstanding concerns over the term reside within the flexible nature of the word if and when it is to be used. At present time, the term cladotherian has little limiting how large or narrow of a grouping of related animals it can encompass. This is primarily due to the nature of rarely used terms given the lack therians who actively use it personally as well as the nature of therianthropy being so personal by very nature.

As present, a cladotherian is usually thought of to be someone whose theriotype is a whole genus, a whole family, order, or possibly broader. However, a problem arises if cladotherian is used to refer to specifically as being a whole genus or family as a theriotype rather than a group of related animals that might be in the form of a taxonomic rank such as a genus or family. This being that some animals only have on species labeled under a genus both extinct and extant.

One concern resides in when an where one might cease to be a cladotherian and hence forth be better described as a polymorph, or one without a set form at all and instead experiences shifts of many different animals regardless of ancestral lines. In the end, it might depend on one’s individual therianthropy and what animals they identify with. However when someone is questioning being a cladotherian for such a wide range of animals, such as within a certain class or order, looking into being a polymorph with merely a focus on certain kinds of animals may be wise just as someone looking into being a family or genus might want to continue question if they are not mistaken and do have a certain species theriotype.

There stands to reason, that one of the common concern for the term cladotherian is if an individual were to try and uses the term to mean only several or many species of animal within a group rather than actually all animals within said grouping.  For example, if a person identified a red fox and gray wolf, but then discovered their connection to golden jackal and in turn decided they there a cladotherian for all Canidae without actually also identifying with all the other canines such as the African wild dog or Dhole, then the term by its own definition would be used improperly  and such a person instead would be perhaps better defined as a polytherian.

A final concern is if the term might accidentally be used by someone simply because they can not or are to lazy to narrow down their theriotype down to a specific species and instead leave themselves at a certain genus or family. There is a difference between, for example, a feline therian who is unsure of their exact theriotype and a feline cladotherian who knows their theriotype. Being a cladotherian is instead for those who have come to the conclusion of what their theriotype is and have found what they identify as/with. They have ended their active search and found they can identify with/as a group of animals within one.

Cladotherianthropy might not be a common way someone’s own personal therianthropy can present, but there are those who have and do use the term to describe their own therianthropy, such as myself. The term has a long history within the online therian community thought being a rarely used label it is not without its use for those who feel the need to use it.


Works Cited

"Cladistics." Your Dictionary. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. <http://science.yourdictionary.com/cladistics>

"Tree of Life Cladogram." OLogy. American Museum of Natural History. 15 Jun 2011. <http://www.amnh.org/ology/features/treeoflife/pages/cladogram.php>.

 - Pantairin

Date First Written: January 2009; Date Last Updated: February 2014

The story of how we found the therian community is a bit of an odd tale. By at the latest of the age of 7, we already had a general grasp on our nonhuman identities. Our finding the online community and coming into awareness of the community’s existence was more of a gradual series of events that drew us even closer to its final conclusion.

To begin, it should be noted that our general and rough understanding of being nonhuman in identity occurred while we were still children. Our early childhood memories are vague in places, but we know for sure that we had some idea that we didn’t identify as human in some way by at least the age of 6 or 7.

The first hint to us that we are not alone in our experiences and identities came to us while we were still in our childhood. At the age of 9 in 1999 we met someone who identified as a fox. We ended up confiding and sharing our thoughts and feelings to one another from then on. We talked about our feelings of wanting to act out animal behaviors which we were having to teach ourselves to control. We also discussed feelings of limbs and such which were not there on our bodies as well. So on and so forth on whatever we experienced at that time in our lives. Our friendship gave our multiple system an early boost in confidence in our identity thought it did not put an end to our childhood doubt completely.

Then in the August of 2003, the hour documentary Animal Imitators aired on the television channel TLC. We had managed to catch a preview stating what it was about and so managed to record the whole documentary on VHS. We did so due to finding something about the preview we had seen oddly familiar and the actual documentary did not disappoint us.

The documentary went over the lives of various people. Some were more interested in the body modification, some of the people were more of the furry persuasion (and called themselves furries), others were more therian in persuasion (one of which even directly calling himself a “were”), and a few were a mix of one or more. Furries meaning a person who is a fan of anthropomorphic animals in media, and a certain percentage creating and wearing costumes of an animal. While were is another term for therian which was primarily used during the 90s and early 2000s before almost fully falling out of favor to “therian” until the early to mid 2000s.

One of those interviewed was Stalking Cat, a man who had had numerous tattoos and body modifications done to look more like a tiger. At one point he stated, “I’ve been a cat my entire life. I’ve always related to cats, I’ve always had a close relationship with cats.” We sympathized and felt similar to him in some sense. Not so much for the desire to take surgical action on our body, but the sense of some dysphoria to our body regardless.[1]

 Another person’s interviewed who really stuck out and whom we couldn’t help but feel similar to was a man named Coyote Osborne. The narrator of the documentary, introduced Coyote by stating, “Not all […] feel a need to transform their bodies. Some just accept they are an animal trapped in a human skin.” Coyote Osborne talked about having past life memories and dreams about being a coyote as well talked about how he felt he wasn’t human even though his body was physically human. The first time watching the documentary, we couldn’t help but identity with so much on what Coyote said. Of having dreams, of feeling like a creation animal, of drawing how we felt we should look like, and more.[2]

There were a number of things the documentary brought up that we didn’t fully grasp or not notice at all until later. However, what we did grasp meant a lot to us. Those of us who identified as Earthly animals or werebeast took comfort in the greater knowledge that we were not alone even more than what we had previously thought.  Everyone else in the system even, while the documentary didn’t pertain to them so much directly, found the idea of there being more people who didn’t identify as human left open a possibility that soothed them as well. We faintly remember watching that documentary many more times in the months and years to come.

Sometime in the summer of 2004 a documentary also aired called Humanimals aired. (It was not the Weird, True, & Freaky half-hour episode titled the same name as that aired December 16th 2008.[3]) We know and remember the hour long documentary aired during the summer of 2004 because it too was recorded by us on VHS. We have never found any information online referencing this old documentary however. The documentary almost exclusively focused on people who had modified there bodies to look more animalistic or whatnot. Some of them stated outright they didn’t identify with an animal at all, while a few stated they did in some way or another identify with an animal. This documentary didn’t strike us as strongly as the other commentary, but still some things seemed familiar to us. It still added to our sense of not being alone in our feelings.

The nudge referencing otherkin and similar communities occurred again in the winter of 2004 when a school friend of ours in junior high and high school mentioned that there were people who were nonhuman spirituality. She had an interest in witchcraft as her father was practicing witchcraft, paganism, and/or the occult (we never fully learned exactly what it was he practiced). They had heard of people who were actually werebeasts, vampires, elves, and dragons. (We remember her specifically mentioned those four.) She didn’t call them by any term nor knew anything more than that really, sadly.

Then, some time in the fall of 2005 while searching through the books at our local library on werewolves Cavern-Risen came across a book called, The Werewolf Book: The Encyclopedia of Shapeshifting Beings by Bard Steiger. The book included one section which interested us the most (enough that we got photocopies of the pages in question back then) called “Spiritual Shape-Shifting.” The section discussed the topic of shamanic and other spiritual practices where a person took on the power or some other quality of an animal. It also touched on the idea of people merely connecting with or identifying with/as a certain animal, as well as mention that some people had dreams, visions, and so on of becoming or being an animal for spiritual reasons. The section also included a mediation exercise to spiritually shapeshift into a wolf.[4] Again, we were left with a feeling of our experiences being a part of some phenomena that other people had been and were experiences elsewhere, but still had no idea where or to what extent there was to it.  

Our lack of direct knowledge of the online otherkin communities changed though in March of 2006. We can’t quite recall the exact date outside that it was in March or early April. Even after all these years we still remember the sequence of events that infolded as we discovered the community online.

Cavern-Risen had been searching and using search engines heavily. She was looking up information on myths and stories of werewolves just out of interest and cursorily while looking for information on real-life werebeasts was more out of wondering what could be online. We all  remembered those documentary interviews of people who were like us and everything else we had come upon over the years, though Cavern-Risen wasn’t directly thinking of them at the time. We were still extremely new to what the internet could be used for so the idea of using it for socializing and networking didn’t even come to mind at all.

We don’t recall what she had thrown into the search engine or how deep into the page results she found the link, but what we ended up finding was the webpage called The Therianthropy Resource. It was the first website about therianthropy we had ever come across. The website was little more than a single webpage with much of the information there apparently taken from other websites with each section credited to the original author. Looking back we can recognize some of the information’s origins, some parts are from Alt.Horror.Werewolves and/or Were.net for sure.

At first, Cavern-Risen honestly thought it was just another werewolf website or something like; however, as she went down the page it became more and more apparent that wasn‘t the case. The webpage began describing something called “therianthropy” and how such people were, in a way, the real kind of werewolves and so on in the world. Several sections went over some personal experiences from their authors and the final section was over shifting and other things. As she read through the text something in the our brain kept feeling a sense of déjà vu on our own experiences as well as vaguely remembering back to those documentaries and so on we had once seen, read, or had been told. Fascinated and wanting to know more about the topic and wanting to be sure of what was being said wasn’t just isolated talk, Cavern-Risen took a few of the terms used and took a search engine to them. From there, we found even more websites and information.

Another website was quickly found called, The Shadow Wulfs Den. The site was old having not been updated in years on that day Cavern-Risen first found it. The website talked about various kinds of experiences more in-depth. Looking back, we can tell that a number of the things in the website are what we (and the greater therian community) would now called ‘fluffy’ in the sense of mixing fact with fiction (mixing in myths of werewolves into how therians actually are) as well as making real world claims (such as physical shifting being real and such). However, the website did give us more insight and ideas to bounce off of with to find and learn more about this topic.

Cavern-Risen kept searching and reading both that day and some more days to come. Over that span of time we came across even more websites, some of which we can no longer remember the name of or they are no longer online all these years later. Some of those websites we found and remember by name included The WereWeb, The Werewolf and Shapeshifter Codex, The Werebeast Support Page, Werelist, Therianthropy.org, Unicorns United, The Draconity FAQ, Eristic.net, and others.

At first, Cavern-Risen was skeptical to if this really did fit what she experienced (and the rest of us did in our own way), but as she read through both these websites and others of which we can’t remember the names of anymore, it kept feeling like complete déjà vu. A feeling of “I know this” and “I experienced that” kept washing over us all in some sense or another. We kept doing research and became more and more convinced that we fit into the words we were reading about and that our experiences fit into these communities.

After that point, we began to lurk in the community. Occasionally coming across a website we hadn’t seen before to look through as well as finding websites to keep going back to. Cavern-Risen held back on joining any forums, and instead we merely lurked forums that we could look at without joining. Forums like Werelist and a few other forums that we don‘t remember the name of anymore.

By summer of 2007 we began to consider joining the community. After a year of lurking, we felt a draw to begin joining in on the interaction and dissuasion. Given, Werelist was one of the visible forums we had been lurking and so had an idea of its atmosphere and content, we felt most comfortable joining it as our first step. However sometime during the fall of 2007, Werelist crashed causing us told back for a little bit longer.

It would not be until November 2007 that I [Earth Listener], who had taken over the front primarily at that point in time, would finally actively take part in the therian community. It was during the fall that we had created a Facebook account and discovered there were several groups on there for otherkin, including ones specifically for therians. So we began joining several of the groups that were active, and the first one we joined was one of the largest ones for therians called Wild At Heart. We also immediately after that joined one simply called Otherkin which was for all kinds of otherkin. After that we began posting and discussing along with the group.

Once we learned that Werelist was back up after having a major crash over a year ago, I [Earth Listener] joined the forum for the first time in January 2008. After that, we joined other forums such as The Awareness Forums in May 2008 and other otherkin forums. Thus, we’ve been around the otherkin communities ever sense somewhere or another. 

- Earth Listener


Bibliography

[1] Pemberton, Justin. Animal Imitators. TLC. 2003.

[2] Pemberton, Justin. Animal Imitators. TLC. 2003.

[3] “Weird, True, & Freaky: Humanimals,” IMDB, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1370125/ (accessed February 11 2014)

[4] Steiger, Brad, The Werewolf Book: The Encyclopedia of Shapeshifting Beings. Detroit: Visible Ink Press, 1999.