Fascinating! It never even occurred to me that there was a word for this, let alone a good portion of people who identified with it.
I sort of have mixed feelings about whether or not I'd identify as Otherkin.
This is the part where you witness a large monologue about myself.
Yay for you!
In younger years, I would've leapt at this thread and rejoiced at finally finding people who understood.
I was a seriously nature-orientated child. My channel of choice was Animal Planet, we had many pets, my father was a bit of a tree-hugger and I was an avid reader of wildlife reference books.
I DESPISED humanity, to the extreme. I really firmly believed I should've been a cat. I sought out animal company first and my own second.
I walked on tiptoes always. I vocalised like a cat. I ate like an animal and lapped at water. I climbed trees and rolled in the sun. And it just felt right, it was the way to do things.
EDIT: Oh yeah, and I bit and licked people. I became very renowned for it!
I really can't emphasise enough how firmly I believed I wasn't human. I'm sure I even felt I had a tail. I moved (and still do move) my ears in situations where a cat would normally do dagger ears. Obviously human ears don't give quite the same effect, but it's that same muscle movement of flattening your ears to your head.
I always felt an affinity for my canine teeth, and now that I have no top front incisors, they truly look like fangs!
I travel easiest in bare feet - one of my most enjoyable experiences was leaping through a forest like a wild animal. I'm an unfit person, but traveling like that I could've run for miles.
Adrenaline rushes felt like a wild animal was unleashed in me, and I'd run for the hills and climb and jump.
I thought I had super-human night vision.
A vivid dream also convinced me that I was able to breathe underwater... (turns out I can't).
Then I struck teen-hood, and tried to find other explanations for why I never managed to fit in.
So I decided I must've been born the wrong gender, and explored my sexuality.
I also explored Wiccan religion.
During this time I also had some, what I perceived as being, divine signs. Though they could well have just been wishful thinking during a tough chapter in life.
Several bad years later, and I'd just written off those feelings as having been an extreme form of escapism/denial.
I still practice spiritual empathy for all living things. I still don't feel right in my body. I still feel like I should be able to run a lot faster than I can, and I still get powerful instinctual feelings, like there is something wild bubbling just below the surface.
And I still get weird comments that there is 'something about me' - one maori artisan declared that I had powerful mana, and told me to pick whichever green stone amulet felt right for me to have for free..A very valuable gift that I've never forgotten. And my ex-girlfriend told me I had an "amazing golden aura".
I suppose the most unusual thing is that this kind of spirituality seems to run quite strongly in my family - though I didn't recognise that until a year or two ago.
Anyway, I'd like to believe it. I really, really would. But now I've grown into a thick-skinned skeptic and I don't have the heart to believe in anything that I don't know to be true.
And honestly, I'm happy with being a bit inexplicably weird and wild.
Besides which, I'd never before even heard of someone who identified as Otherkin, so I just thought I was mad
I think many people are a bit wild inside, with powerful animalistic urges and habits.
It's just that many more have long since abandoned nature and instinct.
Though I do agree that some of the experiences discussed here do seem especially extraordinary!
Magistream has already been a voyage of discovery, the people here are fantastic!
I'll stop adding things now... Sorry for the novel!