How has CDing affected your professional careers

[Emmalee_Summers]

So right now i am an undergrad in chemistry and looking to go to grad school of organic chemistry. i want to be a professor.
so i was just wondering if any of you girls are in a teaching or other professional career and how CDing as affected it. I am sure i will not be dressing at work but if is spend my time outside of work in girl mode like i would love to live my whole life. i figured i would be pretty feminine ever in boy mode. so any thing that can be shared would be nice

lots of love
Emmalee

[linnea]

I have been a tenured professor with a long career in higher education, teaching and doing administrative work at several colleges and universities. That is one reason why no one has known about my crossdressing. Even though universities can be very liberal, non-judgmental, and accepting places, being open about CDing could be dangerous for one's career. Know the institution and your colleagues well before you disclose anything.

[Emmalee_Summers]

Thanks that help. with me trying to embrace the girl side, this has been my only real concern.
lots of love
Emmalee

[urmilaaa2008]

I have been a tenured professor with a long career in higher education, teaching and doing administrative work at several colleges and universities. That is one reason why no one has known about my crossdressing. Even though universities can be very liberal, non-judgmental, and accepting places, being open about CDing could be dangerous for one's career. Know the institution and your colleagues well before you disclose anything.

I agree with linnea fully and as long as u r not open about it, it may not affect ur career in acedamic field. It may even help u because of the advantageous femme charecterestics, u might develop, which can make u a better teacher, guide, and counsellor
In my field, where i am in the junior level mangement, I really dont know how it is going to affect my future growth, even though i am not open about it. I am saying this because I have lost some of the agressiveness and am more accomadative after i started cding and having been accepted by my wife.
It may be seen as a drawback. I have to see how it goes

[loardata]

Before I retired the rumor going arround the plant I worked at was that I panted my toenails. We had a physical therapy facility at the plant where I did my feet every morning for a wound I had. guess I did not remove all the polish, o well.

[Starr]

i am presently out of work, my career field was in middle management distribution operations. Since i have been out of work i have let my hair grow, keep my nails long and mostly clear coated, and my toenails painted most of the time.
My problem is i don't want to go back to the look i need to get a management job, right now i am trying to decide if i am going to try for management or just find a place where i can work and fit in somewhat with my long hair and nails.

star

[Stephanie Stephens]

Crossdressing has helped me to look inside and discover who I really am. As a general building contractor I work with women clients very often, their husbands usually do not want to be bothered with interior details. So, I jump in and express my ideas and work with the women on such things like interior decorating. They love me.

[Gerard]

I think the academic environment in general is quite accepting, although in the long term the gossip can still damage your reputation, certainly if you want to go all the way to professor. As long as you keep it quiet, it can actually be a benefit if you're more in touch with your feminine side.
As far as looks go, much more is allowed than in regular business environments, including earrings, long hair and such. I had professors like that.

I know there was this story a couple of years ago about a professor who used to wear a skirt, and was allowed for a while, but then new management came in and they changed the dress code and asked him to stop. I can no longer find the story on google.*

In academia the most important thing is the quality of your work/articles, and how well you get along with your peers, anything else is secondary and easily ignored.

*) I think that this was the story I remembered: http://dale-miller.org/ardemgaz_1995_10_17.html

[LeannL]

First of all, good luck with your career. It will be a long road to getting a tenured professorship in any field but especially chemsitry.

The effect of being transgenered will vary by what school you can get a job and who can predict what things will be like in the 6 or 7 years before you are actually working. (Remember you probably won't get a job unless you do at least one post-Doc.) While you don't appear to think you are TS, the example of what has happened over the last few years in Michigan might be telling.

Lynn Conway is now retired and is approaching 70 years of age. So her story is of the old days. She is a brilliant electrical engineer and her pioneering work is a key to making the CPU you are reading this on wo efficient. She transitioned while at IBM and was fired for doing so. She eventually went on to become a professor at U of Mich. During this whole time, she remained stealth. No one knew that she was once a man. A truely interesting story. You can read about it at her website: http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/

On the other hand, you can also look at Julie Nemecek who was a professor at Spring Arbor University. (I have had the pleasure to have known Julie as she was realizing who she was and then do what she had to do.) In her case, she lost her job because of her "condition". The initial problems came about because people saw her with some girly things on while she was out and about in town. I think it started with earrings but I might be mistaken. The newsweek article about her and others may be of interest to you:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/34772

Leann

[urmilaaa2008]

I read lynn's story. What a remarkable woman. we should all salute her. even with the psycological pressure she might have had while trapped in the wrong body, she could do so much at IBM. and her courage to start over again and achieving bigger success should be a source of inspiration to others.
thanks leann for bringing it the notice of all of us in this forum.

[Marisa_M]

CDing did not affected my career itself but it has improved a lot my relationship with my female coworkers. Now I talk more than ever with them, I better understand their feeling and needs and we also talk about feminine subjects.

We enjoy wonderful chats with the girls.

[suchacutie]

I too am a tenured professor, and am a chemist, and have been an academic administrator. As said above, logic and discression are important in any competitive field. Your feminine self is not the only thing that will require discression as you advance in your career, that is for sure.

Having said that, I also agree that being more in touch with feminine issues and concerns can give you much insight along the way. Personal connections in the academic community are a must along the path toward tenure and promotion. Not only must your research and teaching be top notch, you must be a part of the academic community...hence the personal interactions that are so important.

My best wishes on your path toward an academic career. It can be a very rewarding career path.

tina

[JoAnne Wheeler]

My career is in the legal field - I am in the public eye and the amount of business I receive is based on a lot of things - however, trying to work while dressed would probably destroy my career

JoAnne Wheeler

[terrinoble]

I rather envy Stu Rasmussen.

[GaleWarning]

In my experience, the teaching profession does not embrace any form of "eccentricity". PC-ness, yes! Individuality, no!!

[Sally2005]

The sad part about the business world due to competition is first you need to establish yourself before being yourself. Coworkers will latch on to anything unusual to discredit you, but if you get everyone to love you as much as sliced bread first they will defend almost anything you do later.

[Emmalee_Summers]

Thanks for all the wonderful advice, it really makes me feel better about everything.
Lots of Love
Emmalee

[Tora]

As many have noted, disclosure of this activity would be harmful to my ability to support my family and this activity. Since I have not been cross-trained for honest work, I will not mention it. Lynn's story is truly wonderful, God Bless her.

[MissConstrued]

however, trying to work while dressed would probably destroy my career

I knew this young lady who had that sort of career....

[JamieG]

Emmalee.

I am also an academic, and have been on both sides of the tenure process. If you are serious about an academic career, you need to be careful. Tenure decisions can be very subjective: two people can look at the same CV and come to very different conclusions. You don't want to give a narrow-minded biggot a reason to take a negative reading of your body of work. For this reason, no one at my schools knows that I am a CD and I do not dress in public.

However, if it is important to you that you be able to dress as you like on your own time, my best advice is to find a graduate (and then subsequently a faculty) position at a school which is clearly supportive. This means more than just having an LGBT organization on campus. You should talk to LGBT students and faculty and ask if they have encountered any problems with being open about their sexual/gender identity. If possible, find TG people at these places because sometimes the T in LGBT is an afterthought, and they don't understand the issues we face. Unfortunately, this will greatly reduce the pool of places you can attend/work, and might mean you have to compromise on other factors such as geographic region or school reputation.

I wish you luck. An academic career can be very difficult, but it can also be very rewarding.

[Sarah V]

It hasn't yet. And that is exactly why I keep my private life exactly that...private.

[Noxvictum]

To answer the title question, it almost got me kicked outta the navy once. Just almost. Got some funny looks after that whole incident, but I knew for sure after that who my friends are . That's sometimes a very hard piece of information to find.