I'm going to come clean.
If you read this post and you know me, then I will deny that I ever wrote it. If you are curious about it, then I am not the one to ask. I don't know the how or why of it. I only know what I experienced.
I had my first change when I was about 11 years old. I was walking along the railroad tracks by myself one summer evening and it happened. I didn't feel it happen. There was no growling, no pain, no drama... it just happened. I ran and ran through the woods for hours. Smelling every smell, chasing birds and small critters. I felt alive for the first time in my life. I felt truly free. But, I also felt scared. I was scared that someone would see me. That they would capture me and hurt me. That they would laugh at me or call me a freak.
A year later it happened again. This time, I was at a church BBQ in a park. I felt strange, I felt the need to leave everyone and go into the deep woods. I changed again, and again I ran. As I was enjoying the freedom, I heard someone and I was afraid. I hid in the trees and they walked near me. I became so terrified that I ran up a hill nearby and they saw me. When they did, they ran away in horror. Later, I returned to the church BBQ and they did not recognize me. It was then that I knew that I had the power to scare people.
All through my teen years knew I was wildly different from other people. No one would be my friend or relate to me at all. They were all afraid of me. Many years later at another church party I had to leave in a very big hurry because I knew I would change. I ran again and I even howled. But, the fear of them all made me hide, and made me ashamed.
I used to spend my free time in the woods watching people and following them. I knew if they saw me they would run. But, they felt my presence anyway and were afraid. Some even took the labor of trying to find me, but their senses were dull and they were clumsy in the woods. It was this time that I learned to smell their fear. I was emboldened by this, but I was also still afraid that they would find out it was me.
As I grew older my changes happened less and less. By the time my first child was born I did not change anymore. But, I still felt afraid. I still loathed the presence of people. They still sensed something was different about me, and they were still scared of me. Every one of them felt it and every one of them hated me in some way for it.
After I was baptized, the urges went away completely and I had forgot about the freedom. I even forgot about the changes. Then one day I lost my temper at someone while walking in the woods. I flew into a rage and nearly attacked them. This person curled up into a little ball and started crying. A 350lb man reduced to tears. Later another friend who witnessed my rage broke into tears describing what I had become. He told me he had never been as scared as he was that day. It was then that I began to remember. I knew that I had started to change in front of them. I knew that my anger overshadowed my own fear which kept me from changing. I knew I drew out the primal fear in them.
Now, as I am estranged from God I know that the change will come again. I know that the fear and loathing will emerge. I yearn for the feeling of freedom again, but I am terribly afraid that if I change again I will run away and never change back. The shackles of fear and rejection will be gone and I will be left with rage and freedom.
That being said, I have never met anyone who has this same condition.
