Therian

[Jellybellyniki]

Has anyone heard of this term?
it’s supposedly a reference to identifying as an animal or enjoy dressing and acting like one according to my almost 12 year old.
Well she is suddenly into this phase after watching videos on tik tok and I’m quite concerned about the obsession she now has over it.
for the past 3 months she spends the majority of her days making animal costumes to wear around the house while making the sounds of the animal. Each week will be a different animal. Admittedly at times I have snapped and told her to stop being silly. I guess I’m concerned she will be bullied for it as she begins secondary school next week.
her primary school queried if she may be autistic before this phase appeared, but I had no support from anyone and my gp wouldn’t refer as in their words it would take until adulthood to diagnosis! I do wonder if there is a connection.
ive Never heard of this before or where to even begin working out what to do. She keeps it secret at home, doesn’t do it in public and hides it from extended family by choice.
do I let her carry on and hope it fades out eventually? My husband thinks it could be the start of a mental health issue but I don’t want to assume this at a young age.
any advice would be appreciated.

Waiting you are talking in general terms about autistic special interests, which is fine. But this issue is Therian identity being presented as a fundamental core belief and young children being exposed to some quite persuasive and controversial ideology. There are parents on this thread with children who are not autistic too.

It took me about 5 minutes of watching these videos and looking at the hashtags and comments to find some very unpleasant stuff. And I’m not talking about unkind comments.

A small update on our experience. The kicker came when she sent me links to a tail (which was one of the first hits on Amazon when she searched therian tail) and I had to refuse because it came with.... a butt plug attachment 😑. She obviously hadn't seen this but I could not in good faith buy it and told her why. She was horrified.

She also crossed a red line by adding someone she'd played warrior cats with on roblox on tik tok where previously I've only allowed her to add real world friends. She suggested she got rid of tik tok herself after i confronted her. It's not the first time she's got it then decided it wasn't good for her. She does seem to realise that she's susceptible to things.

A day later she casually dropped into conversation that she realised she wasn't a therian and had just spent too much time online and it's never come up again since. I don't doubt she'll continue to explore things but for now she's done with it.

@Tbobomb do you have a view on what it is that changed her mind? I wish mine would have that kind of lightbulb moment :(

@Setyoufree not definetly but I've always tried to be open and honest with her about the importance of reality and the difference between imagination /fantasy vs 'real life'.

I made sure to point out its possible to be spiritually connected to animals without being one. I also asked her, if it was not choice (as they are so keen to tell you), why she might think that so many people identify as cats, wolves and foxes instead of chickens, cows and moles. We had a laugh and a cry together and I left her to think.

But in all honestly I think the butt plug tail realisation might have been the straw. 🫣

Hi
I'm going through the same at the moment, my 12 yr old is posting on tiktok videos of him and another child being cats, running around in masks and tails. I'm not convinced my son is a therian and believe he is supporting his friend. But its the friend I am worried about. This friend was born a girl identify as a boy but now identify as a therian. Some of the things this child post are worrying its like they are a cult leader and I don't want my vulnerable son mixed up in that. He has already experienced enough childhood trauma to last a life time. I dont want to push my son away but I am struggling to get my head around this craze at the moment. He is now subject to bullying in school where on tiktok someone has taken his video and has written nasty horrible things over top and re posted. This nasty post goes on to say that the other child has taken another and my child has the disease known as furry disease. My eldest son is disowning his brother and its all heartbreaking to watch. What can I do?

Just to add my son don't post on his tiktok he has nothing on there but this other child made a joint account and has posted on there so unsure if my child has given permission for posting.

@GladPlumJoker
I would keep my child away from this other one, and I would also make sure they didn’t access or post on social media - theirs or someone else’s.

You can’t help it if the other child’s parents let them do all sorts, but you can parent your own child.

I’ve just stumbled on this thread as my dd aged 9 has also just announced she is a therian in quite a serious non frivolous way. She has access to YouTube and has been following the craft side of the therian thing as others have said. I monitor her YouTube. I’m going to restrict it further now as described by someone on here as this seems to be a dark hole she could fall down. She isn’t autistic and has a lot of friends no issues socially but is quite anxious. I wondered how everyone else is getting on

Hi, we're in a similar boat- started off a seemingly harmless with crafting masks and a bit of wearing a tail at home but now starting to get more adventurous and wanting to meet a (known) friend in public to jump around in their masks and tails. We've had the conversation last night, I'm sure we've said a million things wrong and it just seemed like her world was ending so going to try and do some damage control today. I feel sad, like what she has taken from it is that we don't accept her, whereas we really tried to steer the conversation towards the potential dangers of grooming, and how being a therian made her feel- and if anything else made her feel the same way. We'll see how it goes x

hi yea so its not related to autism. being a therian is when you identify AS an animal. if you say your a therian but do your not an animal you are a fake one. therians identify as animals mentally and/spiritually. if your child says they are a therian but they dont think they are an actual animal they might get bullied by other therians. some therians get shifts when they shift into an animal mentally and sometimes see and feel ears and tails on them. im not a therian myself but i know some and also im a furry- being a furry is liking anthropomorphic characters and sometimes we make our own and its like an animal version of ourselves called fursonas. we dont think we are our fursonas but sometimes we fursuit. fursuiting is wearing an animal costume of our fursonas. it is not sexual for most parts but it can be!

I think this illustrates exactly how innocent and perfectly normal child role play can get mixed up with bullying, grooming and exploitation from other kids and (potentially predatory) adults in these online spaces.

Anything that encourages parental alienation would ring alarm bells for me.
Kids being kids is one thing but the spectre of YouTube channels and sharing this stuff wider - parents are sleepwalking into safeguarding nightmares.
Please be aware of what your kids are actually doing and who they are interacting with.
Creepy adults will be getting off on this somewhere.

Yes I agree with this as a mum of two autistic preteens who thank god aren’t into this nonsense as if they were I would shut it straight down! Seems like a weird fetish to me can’t believe parents allow their kids to do this autistic or not 😑 my autistic daughter hates animals

My daughter told me last year she was a therian. I think it all started from the movie turning red. I don’t see the harm honestly, she makes masks and jumps round the yard. She’s being creative and getting lots of exercise. She has another friend at school who is one too and they hang out together. I expect it’s just a phase. But I don’t think it’s a bad thing. She sees a psychologist and we have spoke to the gp. Neither think it is a problem. Her masks are actually amazing, she paints them and covers them in fur and stuff. Way better than anything I could make!

0h and its not a phase its a identity Neodymium

Oh christ, what a load of tosh.

Quick scan on twitter/X and there's a big trans/therian crossover with a lot of sexualised drawings. Be very careful what your children are accessing.

Yep, this. It’s all Queer Theory related. And as a PP said, family alienation also features.

Red flags galore.

Bro wth, BEING A THERIAN IS NOT A "PHASE"!!!

And being a "therian" is not a "mental disorder" or a "mental issue"!

Why are you letting an 11 year old use social media with a 13 age limit?

By love do you mean sex? Furries do fall under the kink umbrella, it’s really not true to say that sec and fetish isn’t part of that type of play