thinking about werewolves and the concept of becoming a monster and discovering that something savage and uncontrollable exists within you and the potential that has to be a liberating narrative about growth and change and courage rather than a story about controlling and concealing it
Being a werewolf is about shame. I think itâs also about anger, trauma, not belonging, and the fear that you might be unlovable.
The shame of being a werewolf has to be that you were bitten by the wolf, and you survived. You survived because you became the wolf yourself. You are this terrible, monstrous thing, and the terrible, monstrous thing is you. Itâs the part of you that survives the attack, and itâs terrifying that this is you.
I feel like werewolves are people who are very hurt. Not only that, theyâve spent their lives up to this point trying as hard as they can being whatever the opposite of a werewolf isâsomething tame, something yielding, something thatâs not angry and unpredictable and bestial. But the Wolf is also them. Because no matter how much you donât believe it, you want to make it. You want to survive, and you will fight so that you will live.
Or werewolves are people who are incredibly afraid. Itâs about the inevitability of not being lovable; being a monster is unforgivable. Itâs about the inability to withstand anything that will happen to you. Itâs about your body betraying you. Itâs about carrying a terrible and ugly you inside you, locked up where no one can see it, because the thought of anyone else seeing that you is unbearable. Itâs about all of those things and more.
I think the Wolf is the part of you that loves you, unconditionally. Itâs the part of you that bites when something tries to hurt you. When something tries to put you back in the place youâre supposed to be. Of course itâs scary. Itâs scary to find that you are impossibly strong and maybe selfish, and that your self-hatred isnât enough to save you from the savage, stubborn knot of self-love you carry in your chest. But itâs also the answer to that question: What if I am awful? What if I am terrible, too terrible to look at, too terrible to love? What if you are a monster? Well, what then?
