Hi, My name is Jade Sinapu. Jade is my favorite color and gemstone, and Sinapu is the Ute word for Wolf. (I may change this name but for now it fits well I think.) The wolf is essentially my spirit animal and has a great significance to me and has been a reoccurring theme in my
entire life. I am an electrical engineer working in aerospace as a programmer, circuit designer, and test engineer. Due to my type of work, I often have no access to internet, cellphone or the outsideworld in any way for 12 hours per day. So I may post sporadically.
I am I guess what is called a grey muzzle being in my 30's now, and I wish I found this hidden better world a decade or more ago! I sure hope there is room for an older German Shepard Wolf mix in the group! I will work on my fursona image as soon as I can! For now, my pic is of my beloved dog Heidi!
How I found this fandom is simple. I was at work when my friend came in for Halloween as a Dragon! This is amazing considering we work at a huge, conservative, strict company! Well, I wasn't as respectful as I should have been, and was asking too many prying questions about her attire. My dragon friend (who is a good anime and manga artist) handled it very well and quickly taught me the truth about furies. I knew "furriness" wasn't new, but also knew nothing about it except for the lies on TV/internet. I privately had some preconceived bad ideas about furies and I seriously apologize to the whole community; I was very wrong. All of this is hard for me to talk about, because over the course of a month, I had a mental breakdown after I came to the abrupt realization that I am a type of furry and have been one for a very long time! I didn't know it was real. I lived under a rock. In fact I identify with furry more than anything in my life so far. It has made me question everything I thought I knew about myself, religion/spirituality/beliefs, sexual orientation, purpose, sanity etc... I didn't sleep for 3 days straight because of it! I was in denial about myself. I know it may sound like I am taking this too seriously, since its a hobby, but nevertheless it happened. I was so wrong to judge people I didn't know anything about!
I feel like I fell into a trap door, and was dangling upside down by a shoelace, observing a strange new world and no one knew I was watching. What I saw was truly amazing and it filled me with child like joy! I hadn't felt that in so long! People being true to themselves having fun! A world where you could be what you wanted to be and no one would judge. Anything seemed possible! I felt younger! I then felt old as I realized I missed out on being myself for most of my life, and was considered a "creepy" grey muzzle due to my inability to stop the passage of time!
I broke down crying very hard as if someone had died, and i supposed that is exactly what happened. The bad part of me died that day. I was awakened to something special. Was I starting to become who I really wanted to be?
My interest in the furry fandom must have started with childhood (even though I didn't know it) when I would secretly watch cartoons and movies instead of doing homework etc... as well as my long history of interactions with dogs and coyotes. I would see an anthropomorphic creature,i.e. Charlie from All Dogs go to Heaven for example, and imagine how it would be to exist in his world and not the real one. I felt his troubles and yearned to help him. And I identify with Ash from Fantastic Mr. Fox, and wish I could have been more like Disney's Robin Hood. And of course there are the many ultra realistic dreams of living as a wolf... which I never mentioned until now. Oh yeah, and the 2 years I spent walking around with coyotes at night in the field near my house, watching them, petting one, almost being part of their family. And how can I forget the Pet-co Incident... I was at the store to buy pet supplies, and got distracted. To my left was a girl ( as a cat) in a cage, raising money for homeless animals. Now I am rather shy, but I fast walked to her cage, and said Hi. She then proceeded to tell me about her fundraising efforts, and showed me how much they needed. If they achieved the goal, she was able to be free! That's when it happened. I got the wallet, removed all the cash (~$250!) stuck it in her hand/paw and excitedly asked, Is that enough to free you from your cage, when can you get out of there?!
My mind had been erased... Its sorta creepy I admit.
As a child I often wore the dogs collar and pretended to be a dog and thought this okay. I even growled in my sleep at times! My father used to make flies for fishing and had many animal products
. One of these was a real fox tail, which I promptly "reclaimed" and wore whenever I could (in private). The feeling I got wearing it was something strange, powerful and nice. I have always had a connection and a way with larger wolf like dogs, German Shepard, Huskies, Malamutes etc. I keep collecting wolf/coyote/dog themed things its an obsession. I still to this day wear a dog collar when I sleep, mostly as a reminder of the fact that a German Shepard saved me by actively preventing me from carrying out suicide, and another German Shepard saved me from a carbon monoxide leak which almost killed us both.
In our childhood home, unfortunately, there were few luxuries due to money constraints, but our imaginations were overflowing. We had no video games and few art supplies and self expression seemed to be rather stifled at times. Our parents forgot what a child was supposed to be and do (they had no childhood), and the word FUN seemed to be absent from their vocabulary. So being a dog/human was out of the question, so was learning to draw (they thought it a waste of time). My parents were and still are very judgemental about a person not being 100% straight, and my being "odd" has always been an issue in our house as they automatically assume I'm "gay". I have always told people the truth, I'm almost always non-sexual, but they find that hard to believe. They would rather me lie and say what they wanted to hear! So I didn't fit in and turned to science, math, engineering, programming, and my animal friends who didn't judge me and loved me truly.
Again I turned to the open spaces around the house full of wildlife. My longing to be more animal and less human at times made me into what I am now. I would rather be that way since I saw around me a lot of bad being done by humans, the superior species. Animals were my protectors, teachers and friends and got me through the toughest times of my life so far. And when I saw an animated talking human/animal as a child it resonated with me as a piece of a better world. It still does. Think Zootopia.
So I am not sure if I am a therian, otherkin, furry, or something else. All I know is that finding this fandom was a true shock to me, as in it I found people who are more like me and I wasn't alone anymore. But alas, perhaps I still don't truly fit in? I have little artistic talents, don't know much about gaming/role playing and am "too old" I suppose. I hope that be being in the fandom, I can get back into drawing, creative writing, maybe do some fursuiting, furmeets, and learn about what the fandom has to offer. And in return I hope to give back to the community in some way. I hope I can find some friends who get me, and I want them to teach me more about all things furry. I have a lot to learn!
Sorry this was so long.