The first thing I realized going through puberty in the middle of the eighties was that I was different because every other classmate quickly became interested in the opposite sex, but not me. While my friends and classmates had their first girlfriends and boyfriends, I simply felt that this wasn´t the right thing for me.... Back then, there was no internet you could use to research on what the hell is wrong with you, so I even wasn´t able to give my orientation a proper name. I did some research by searching every available library and eventually found some books of "sexology" and psychiatry that dealt with sexual interest in animals. Not too satisfying, though. It was only until the beginning of the nineties when the term zoophilia began meaning something to me...with some IRC chats enabling us "animal fuckers" to connect for the first time in our lives.

My special "moment of truth" was in ´87 : me, sitting in a classroom, bored, checking out the posters sticking to the classroom wall; somehow, I found myself staring at one poster showing a Haflinger mare with her foal. I was sitting for about 30 minutes until I realized I was staring at her for the last half an hour, looking into these big brown eyes. Magnetic, radiant, deep...and I suddenly knew that if I ever would fall in love , it would be with a mare. This was what I was waiting for, what I was searching for in vain in humans...at this moment, I couldn´t give less about the fact that I felt love for horses, for animals I never had a relation to, I despised as "girlie stuff". It just felt right.

I always was some kind of a loner, very independent, so it didn´t bother me too much what other people might think of me. I never felt shame or "feeling betrayed by nature" for not having a "normal" orientation; the whole guilt issue never was present in me. But what I started to feel once I realized I need a mare as my partner was tremenduous pressure: still being a complete virgin back then, I wanted to have my first time with a mare so badly and this increasing,enormous tension brought me to a point I emotionally collapsed. On a new year´s eve, I swore to myself that I won´t procrastinate anymore,that I needed to escape that feeling of loneliness and so I started taking riding lessons in one of our area´s riding clubs. Not in the same fashion like the other youngsters who only took riding lessons once or twice a week, I took a riding lesson every day, often even two or three lessons a day. I quickly gathered enough knowledge to be seen fit to care for a small mare the owner lost interest in and intended to sell. That´s when my very first time with a mare happened, on a beautiful Saturday noon in summer while all the other horseowners were gone for a tournament. After my first sexual experience with this mare, I knew I had found my happiness, my orientation (although I had no name for it yet) and my peace of mind. This was what I am living for...horses.

I saw myself as attracted to animals significantly before I ever really concluded I was a zoophile. I remember between 12 and 14, having a fascination with Pokemon, actually, and Pokemon pornography was the first thing I voluntarily searched out, and made up my first sexual fantasies (I had masturbated before then, but the event was not at all pleasurable - the opposite, really - and had no accompanying fantasies).

Over the next two or so years I slowly realized that I was attracted to animals as a whole. Really I had no right to take so long to realize this - it's not like a Mightyena is so different from just a regular dog, at least as they're usually depicted, but realizing I was attracted to real animals was, I suppose, a bigger step than I give it credit for.

Even now, I stick with drawn pornography, in part because there's a far lesser chance of that sort of thing being involved with any of the abuses prevalent in other forms of pornography.

I feel like I'm focusing on porn a lot, but I don't have a lot of real life experience, so most of my transition has been realizing my attractions rather than having any opportunity to act on them.

I was never really ashamed of what I was attracted to. It felt very natural for me. I have nonetheless become more... How to put it... Enthusiastic, I suppose? About defending zoophilia as an orientation since, and would call myself an activist, in at least a minor way now.

Well my whole life I'v absolutely loved dogs, really liked spending time with them. it was around the same time I felt attracteiction to girls that I felt attraction to dogs aswell.

However i didn't know about the term zoophile untell my early 20's

I'm not sure where I realised. I looked a lot at dogs, and well, wanted to be around them preferred over anyone else. A lot of it consisted of denial

At one point I had a foster dog, whom I was totally in love with, she was wonderful, and wanted to stay around me.

Fast forward a few years, and I have this relation with another dog, totally unexpected, turned a little sexual. Still didn't want to call myself "zoo" even though at this point, it's pretty obvious

It was all so natural, what i missed in human relations. And thinking back, even tho I'm not happy with myself (don't know why) it was the best experience I had.

Accepting it, well I'm far from that. I'm ashamed, and can't give it a spot. I know that looking from a dogs view, a relation is fine, but somewhere it feels iffy, and I don't like that feeling.

I suppose my first inclinations that way arose when I was 13-14. I started getting really attracted to my aunt's black lab, and fortunately had a nascent google to figure that out. It really solidified for me at the age of 16, when over the same week I stayed in a home with two wonderful labrador bitches, and then had my aunt's black lab at my house for a while, that I saw this as the same sort of thing my friends were finding out in their awkward hookups, just with a different target.

When I understood it, I never felt guilty really, but I did feel isolated. Partially that was an issue of my personality already (which I've dealt with, thankfully), but also feeling such a strange attraction in a time when even being gay wasn't quite accepted yet... that was a struggle.

I new I was a zoo since I was about 16 years old.

long story (but it's a long question, and a really good one).

i had never heard the term zoophile until my very early 20s, i think. so i realized i was attracted to animals much earlier than i knew a word for it. i also had a different kind of attraction (just visual/platonic) to them before i was sexually aware, so i don't know if that could be considered part of the same thing or not. i couldn't even tell you when i started really being drawn to animals, but i certainly wasn't aware of it.. that would have required some self-reflection that i doubt i was capable of at that young of an age. things started turning sexual for me i would guess around the age of 12 or so. i don't remember a lot about when exactly i started trying to do sexual things with our dogs started.. might not have been 'til 13 or so, but masturbation did occasionally involve books or documentaries showing animal mating or even just slight glimpses of genitalia.

sorry for jumping around, time-wise, but i realize that due to trying to show how "smart" i was to a friend (this was before i was sexually aware, maybe age 9?) -- showing that i knew enough about sex to know that a penis went with a vagina .. only i showed him with our female cat... which was told to my brother.. which was told to my parents. i learned then that i had to hide any such thoughts. there was definitely shame once i was physically capable of being sexual with our dogs, but it had more to do with the fact that i was, to be painfully honest, doing things against the dog's will (no penetration, just masturbation; spayed female on her back). i still am ashamed of it (as anyone should be), but i can't change what happened.

another part of the shame was shame about sexuality in general. the visual/platonic part of my attraction to animals developed into something romantic that i fought hard to keep separate from my sexual attraction, so i had a double whammy of guilt when i had sexual release involving animals or thoughts of animals.

it wasn't until i was in my early to mid 20s that i finally had a relationship with a female dog who appreciated and enjoyed sexual contact (though it was still non-penetrative sex with a spayed female). i would say that was my awakening -- that it was possible to have (and most importantly that i was capable of having) a positive sexual experience with an animal and want them to enjoy it as much as i enjoyed it. i still wouldn't have called it love, but it was getting closer. it was a long time after then, though, before i was able to have any real (i.e. penetrative) experience with a dog (though not for lack of trying). my first time was only 3 years ago (i'm 40+) despite a few attempts over the 4 years prior to that. now that i'm having regular sex with a willing partner it's much less stressful/shameful to me. i worry about getting caught, and occasionally i still worry about my motivation vs. what my partner gets out of it, but it's far rarer. those first sexual experiences still trouble me, but i try to channel it into making sure i'm more mindful now of when my partner isn't interested.

the attraction now (and in previous years, the non-sexual/romantic attraction, when i was able to keep it "pure") i see completely as a good thing. i've always felt that it's a gift to be able to see beauty in so many different creatures.

Ginger. I was around 12, already experienced with girls (my babysitter 'initiated' me when I was 8-9), and though I felt a physical attraction to human females, it was weak emotionally. Ginger was my dog at my grandparents, a lil' sheltie mix, and everything I didn't find with girls, I found with her. Sex didn't come heavily into play with her, though some oral and finger-play did occur. Mid 70s, so there was no internet, but I knew the words Beastiality and Zoophilia from the Johnson & Masters studies. I never really felt ashamed of it, nor was my sexual behavior limited to Ginger. I had a lot of girlfriends. It wasn't until Tippy entered my life that I dropped human partners, again before the internet. I don't rationalize my choices, so I've never felt ashamed at that choice either. Come the mid-late 90s, and Tippys death, and I found the internet. It was actually a person on a 'normal' pet bulliten board who told me I'd find better support on a special BB, and guided me to Zoophile.Org. I'm still not ashamed of my lifestyle choice, though I do not share openly what that is (for my animals safety).

Cool thread :)

I had a fascination with animals and humans being brought "closer" even before puberty. I had a crazy imagination as a kid and was fascinated with stuff like shape-shifting and werewolves and the like. When I hit puberty, the fascination became sexual as well. For a while I enjoyed purely animal sexuality. Watching animals mate on Youtube and whatnot...

When I was about 13-14, I was hit by a vision of sorts. I call it a vision because it was so unlike "regular" fantasies that have to be constructed in your mind from scratch. This came to me completely out of the blue in the middle of the day while I was off doing something completely unrelated. It was a dude and a Golden Retriever screwing in cowgirl position on a bed. It had such an impact on me, I remember it like it was yesterday. I let curiosity get the best of me and scoured the the Internet. Was such a thing even possible? From that moment on, almost all porn I consumed was exclusively bestiality. My fantasies were bestiality. I found it so exhilarating.

Although it came very naturally to me, I guess I was disgusted by it somewhat. I never let it "affect" me back then. I pursued relationships with human girls. Bestiality was basically only masturbatory aid. Hell, I didn't even think of dogs in that way back then. At some point, I came in contact with a bunch of people on the Internet that formed loving and even romantic bonds with animals. People who took pride in the word "zoophile." Even with all my love for animals and my obsession with bestiality, I never once thought of myself on those terms.

I don't know what triggered it, but at one point at around 20 I had a complete paradigm shift. It hit me that I too was a zoophile. I gave up my very futile quest for human romance. I realized I wanted and needed a dog more than anything in my life, to be my lover and companion. And I also wanted to lose my virginity to one big time. So I scrapped pretty much all my plans and dreams and started on a path I hoped (still do...) would allow me to have a life where this was a reality.

Then I went to Central America and fell in love with a real, live bitch. Our time together was short, but I felt things for her I did not even know I could feel for another living being. I knew I was a zoo before going, but that experience just cemented that notion in my brain.

There you have it ;)

I'd better share my story.

Since early age, I've been interested in animals more than the average kid. Note, in a platonic sense. But still, I wanted to learn as much as I could about them and not just traditionally 'cute' animals. But after a strange dog chased me around when I was 6, I was afraid of dogs. Anyway, I seemed to think of animals more like individuals than many other humans I knew, and I viewed humans as just another type of animal.

When I was around 16, I already identified as a wolf-person (long story for another time), but I hadn't consciously thought about canines as potential partners yet. It was as if I subconciously was drawn towards this topic, though. I read about debates about zoophilia/bestiality on online forums. Even though the concept had first disgusted me when I had heard about it some years earlier (a fencehopping case with a man and a horse), I came to the conclusion that some cases of bestiality could be acceptable. After all, humans are just animals too, and sometimes animals try to mate with individuals of other species. I had seen a rooster and duck mating on my grandmother's farm without either of them being hurt, so a human and some other medium or large mammal could probably work too. It was around this time as well that I lost my fear of dogs.

I sometimes fantasized about wolves when masturbating. But I still thought that maybe I shouldn't. I tried to change my fantasies to be about werewolves, Anubis and other more human-like canines. So that my fantasies would be more acceptable, since it was about someone who was at least part human and could probably talk.

I had a screensaver with pictures of wolves when I was around that age (18?). I joked about my screensaver with my friends. "Some guys have pictures hot bikini babes on their computer. Some girls have pop stars and male actors on posters. I find beauty in this". This was at my birthday party, and I just said it as a joke. But my best friend asked me, "are you attracted to wolves?". I was so chocked by this question, but I realised that I couldn't lie. So I said yes. "Okay", she said, as if she had just asked me something completely neutral.

Back then, bestiality wasn't illegal in Sweden. It was taboo, but I didn't understand how much of a taboo it was. In the online debates, it seemed like about 25-40% were okay with it as long as the animal wasn't harmed. So at first, I wasn't ashamed when I realised I was a zoophile. It was unusual, okay, but so was being bisexual or into bdsm, so whatever. Love is love, I thought. I like animals, I'm not going to harm them.

I was only a year later or so, when a tabloid wrote about 'animal sex clubs' and painted out all zoophiles as rapists and animal abusers, that I realised how deeply this taboo ran. Suddenly, animal right organisations talked a lot about banning bestiality. People online, who had before just disgusted by the topic, now started to write about how zoophiles should be killed, raped or tortured. Some even argued that for non-active zoos, the attraction was enough to prove that the person was dangerous. People started to petition for bestiality to be illegal. It was during this time, that I started to be afraid and ashamed. I had considered my attraction natural before that, but suddenly I understood how many wished death upon me.

I have since struggled with my confidence about zoophilia. I'm positive that I'm a zoophile, although not exclusively. But I get nervous every time the topic is brought up, afraid that people will notice and judge me. Even though I actually think that love between different species can be a beautiful thing.

I was about 8-9 when I had my first sexual experience with an animal. It was just out of curiosity at that age, I didn't have romantic feelings until puberty hit a year or 2 later. When I was in school, I used to take library books that had pictures of animals in them and cut them out of the books (I was a kid, don't tell me you've never done anything bad as a kid), I'd save animal calendars and take the photos out of those too. My entire room was just a collage of animal pictures. I grew up in the country, with lots of animals around all the time and I was always a loner when it came to humans. I didn't know about my sexuality being an actual thing until around age 18 or so. I found several online communities at that time that are sadly no longer active or are completely erased, and I have done a ton of activism for the community and have met quite a few other zoos in the process. I'm even out to almost everyone I know, I even came out to my mom and she was OK with it. And now, that I'm about to turn 31...my attraction to animals has only grown since then and my attraction to humans has waned an extreme amount and now I doubt I'll ever find another human attractive again.

To summarize my experience I lost my virginity to Mia she was a Siberian husky and I loved her very much. 2 days later she runaway I became depressed, I was scared for her, and still didn't understand anything about my feeling for her and why not other people,etc. I had suppressed the memories to escape the pain but that didn't work because at times I would become really sad and feel the pain and wouldn't know why. It wasn't until my neighbors got a red husky that hoped the fence to pick a fight with the GSD in my other neighbors yard. I puled her away from the fence and started petting her to calm her down, then she turned around and started licking me in the face.I was setting at the time so she pushed me over and was on top of me and that's when the memory's of me and Mia's intimacy and feelings had came back and hit me hard. I took to the internet to learn more about what I was going throw. At first I found haters followed be the activist that argued with them online thin zeta, thin finally the zoo community, my journey ended 2 years ago. When I started to accept myself and what it meant to be a zoophilie throw hardships and good times.

I've pretty much felt this way towards animals for most of my life. It was such a big part of me that I never even realized there was anything different about me compared to other people. I thought everyone felt the same way as I did. I didn't find out until when I was 13 and I drew a comic about a girl and a talking dog. The two were in an open relationship, which to me made total sense, but when I showed the comic to some friends... they did not react well. I got into a big fight with them, and I later did some research on google. I found out about the word zoophilia and I've labelled myself as such ever since.

Im not going to call myself a Zoo, per-say but, I have been attracted to animals since discovering myself at a stupidly young age of five. My parents got a new dog and I had fun with him and many times I was alone with him. He pushed me down one day and well, not to be too graphic here, did something to me which I had no clue what was happening. Only that it did awaken me in a new place. After that I spent more alone "play time" with my dog. Ever since that traumatizing yet pleasuring scenario, I couldnt get dogs out of my mind. I found the word while typing in to google about dog doing the dirty. Ive been quiet about this though. When I turned ten, i finally realized some things, and ever since then have been battling my mind from being ashamed one day, to engaging in my fantasies and being myself the next. when I have a home of my own and am old enough to take care of a dog, I will gladly have a new and loving partner in my life. I hope I get lucky and get a dog that was just as pushy and dominating as my first.