Should I help or keep out of it?

[Emily01]

what a fascinating turn of events!

my first thought would be this.... "to what end?" what outcome are you trying to help her toward?

let's not beat around the bush, there's likely some element of sexuality involved here and so a misstep could be very sobering.

if your purpose is to help her understand that crossdressing isn't a life sentence to homosexuality.....do you know for a fact that's not the case with her son?

if it is to give her assurance that a crossdresser can lead a fairly average and ordinary life you might be just the ticket.

if it's to point her toward resources where she can be more accepting of her son, help him find his own way and the two of them maintain a healthy relationship......i'm sure you can do a great job of that.

the very best of luck to you and them!

[JiveTurkeyOnRye]

if your purpose is to help her understand that crossdressing isn't a life sentence to homosexuality.....do you know for a fact that's not the case with her son?

I've seen this a couple of times in this discussion and it sort of hasn't sat right with me.

we don't know the sexuality of the son, but that shouldn't matter, should it really? There's a difference though between saying the two things don't go hand in hand and saying that there's no way he is.

The point is to say, if he is a crossdresser and he ends up being gay, he's likely not gay because he's a crossdresser and he's not a crossdresser because he is gay.

The emphasis of the discussion should be on the fact that Guynheels is well adjusted, happy, and stable, and that a crossdresser can be such things. And yes, since he *is* straight, that he is happily married to a supportive, amazing woman who accepts him.

I guess I just don't think the point to hammer home for this woman is that she should only be accepting of her crossdressing son if it means he's not likely to be gay.

[Rachel05]

The absolute worst thing about being a cross dresser when I was young, was thinking I was the only one and must be weird and then some, at least this lad has his sister to help him but the mother must be having a struggle and my guess would be believing herself to be at fault, if she can be made to understand that it is not a bad thing and learn to support him, it will in turn help her - me I would try and help the mom

[Steveo]

hi. first of all we need to know that the friend came to guy&heels wife woman to woman, as much as we'd like to think that as crossdressers we instantly become as one with woman kind, this woman has turned to a friend for comfort and support, secondly why is it essentual that guy&heels is supposed to be the expert, two things here in two years how close have the to familys become and that includes the child, and would you feel at fifteen if you found out that your mother had been telling the hole street that you crossdress, one surgestion (only) would be (and this has to be from the mother's persueing the situation with guy&heels wife is as two woman on a learning curve, in as much as you have a problem you came to me for support letts learn together, but it must be the two woman friends as far as i can see. cheers bye

[BLUE ORCHID]

Do yourself a favor don't get involved it could be the most sorry day of
your life run don't walk away from this before it bites youin the a$$.
.
.................................................. ......................thanks......ORCHID

[MissConstrued]

I would recommend that both the mother and the son seek professional help -

Yeah, that won't make Mom think there's anything wrong... "Seek professional help!"



And I'm sure that's feckin' great for the kid, too... "Come along, son, we're going to see a psychiatrist about your... uh... disorder..." Like that won't feckin' scar a kid for life.

Ho-leeee shit.

WTF is wrong with you people?

[Claire Fleming]

I'm a new poster and not sure what I'm doing, but .........

All the replies to the original post are coming from those of us who have been cross dressing for years. We have all accepted this and are living with it one way or another, even if we are still in the closet.

This boy's mother has been faced with CDing for a couple of days. It is probably the first time in her life that she has been involved with it. Not only is her son doing something that she regards as 'weird/freaky/degenerate' (delete as necessary), but her daughter is complicit in it. The two are her whole family.

She has confided in a friend, without knowing her husband is also a cross dresser. I cannot believe that some posters here think that the solution to her anguish (and it WILL BE anguish for her) is for that friend to then reveal that and offer her husband as an expert.

If the mother is to come to terms with her son's dressing it is going to take weeks, if not months. It will almost be like a bereavement. There's no use telling a newly-widowed wife that her husband is in heaven.

What she needs at this early stage is a friend, a shoulder to cry on, support. Only when she starts to accept reality would it be time to start offering advice, information and resources. It may be that the son will promise never to dress again and the sister never to encourage him and the matter will drop. The mother may announce that it is 'fixed' and never mention it again.

A 'one step at a time' approach is needed here and not two size twelves (with or without 4-inch heels) diving in where they will almost certainly not be appreciated.

Almost every poster is looking at this as GnH's 'problem.' GnH doesn't have a problem. Neither has GnH's wife. She has a duty as friend. The 'problem' is the mother's, but she is already sharing it and that's good. The poor woman is probably already imagining her son as gay, walking through the neighbourhood as a girl to her eternal shame, while posters here are concerned about whether she'll blab about GnH to the neighbours or the sister to friend at the high school. She needs a listening ear, reassurance and fortunately GnH's wife through time can give that and also suggest avenues of support. The fortunate circumstance is that GnH is a CD with an understanding wife whose role is to give support through his wife, NOT first hand.

Just my novice's advice for what it's worth.

[Lana_CD]

I just did a google search for "teen son caught crossdressing" and the first answer tha popped up would help her tremendously.
Maybe, the wife could make the suggestion for the mother to do the same and, maybe, even assist her in doing so if she is computer illiterate or doesn't have access to a computer.
Let the mother make the decisions as to how to pursue the information and otherwise stay out of any decision making of how to handle her son's situation.
While there is nothing that can be done about someone being gay, cd, tg, ts or whatever, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it either, in my opinion. We are what we are. The only thing bad is societies views and accwptance of said situations but they are changing. The ratio of cd/gay is no greater than non cd/gay.
Good luck,
Lana

http://www.geocities.com/senorita_cd/children.htm

[iwearstockings]

let your wife have a conversation with the mum, with you present if you wish, but I would avoid talking directly to the child unless invited to. If you do, for your own sake make sure there is someone else present.

[chrissie-h]

An understanding ear is usually the best way to play it. Assuming, of course she wants to open up! Once you're sure you really know what her concerns are, you could try offering alternative views ... to allay her fears. See how she reacts before opening up yourself.

[JiveTurkeyOnRye]

She has confided in a friend, without knowing her husband is also a cross dresser. I cannot believe that some posters here think that the solution to her anguish (and it WILL BE anguish for her) is for that friend to then reveal that and offer her husband as an expert.

I don't think anyone is advocating that GnH be an "expert." All that he serves in this situation as an example for the woman that "it can be ok." He's a crossdresser, and he's ok. That's it.

To use your widowed wife example, it may not help her to be told her husband is in heaven but there are support groups for surviving spouses and they seem to provide a lot of comfort. Being told by her friend that her husband is a crossdresser and that it is not the end of the world if her son is, is not unlike a surviving spouse having a conversation with another, that tells them, I'm not the only one to go through this and I have someone I can trust with my feelings.

[Xenia]

It may be that the son will promise never to dress again and the sister never to encourage him and the matter will drop. The mother may announce that it is 'fixed' and never mention it again.

Yes. Repress, deny, repress, deny, repress, deny. How many of us here have been through this scenario, of promising a parent or significant other that "I'll never do it again!" only to find it's an impossible promise to keep? Here, the kid gets driven deeper into hiding and learns he can't be completely honest with his mother, and Mom goes right on believing her son's a freaky pervert and just pretends not to think about it. Isn't this exactly what we should be trying to avoid?

The calls for professional help seem to be way overboard, too. Sure, maybe down the road, if the kid really does have deep-seated gender dysphoria or suspects he might be transsexual, then yeah, let's talk about professional help. But we have no way of knowing if that's the case. Maybe he just likes playing dress-up. That's as far as it goes with me, and I sure as hell don't need professional help.

And here's another way to come at this: Say guynheels is completely in the closet here, and intends to stay that way forever. Any hesitancy to reveal himself would certainly be understandable. But say he keeps his mouth shut now, and at some point in the future, either decides to uncloset himself or gets accidentally outed. What would Mrs. Nextdoor think then? She'd think he's a hypocrite and a selfish prick for not speaking up when he could have done some good, most likely. And it would definitely reinforce any ideas she had about CDing being a shameful thing that should always be kept secret.

P.S. Oh, yes, guynheels, we need an update here. I'm too invested in this now not to know how it all ends.

[VeronicaMoonlit]

Ho-leeee shit.

WTF is wrong with you people?

Shame. To some, it's a shameful thing, this thing of ours, that no one can ever know about. Hell, I still have shame issues at times, and in part that's one of the reasons I post my real name with every post (that'll change if I ever start my transition) So, for some, the very thought of coming out in a limited way to the mother to help the kid is very frightening. I'd also hazard a guess that the average age of the "stay out of it" folk is higher than that of the "help the woman" folk.

My late mother and sister have carte blanche in this matter. They can tell whomever they want, and I know my sister has done so.

Veronica
Rondelle (Ron) Rogers Jr.

[Jenny Brown]

Shame. To some, it's a shameful thing, this thing of ours, that no one can ever know about. Hell, I still have shame issues at times

True. And that's exactly why the kid's Mom freaked out. cd-ing is not normal. It's considered a shameful thing. Whether it is or not isn't the point here. Society's attitude won't be changing anytime soon.
And to whomever: please don't run that old cd routine of "it's society's problem, not ours" because that's not true and you know it.
This thread has reached almost a 100 posts for what?
It's a no-brainer. [SIZE="4"]Stay out of this situation[/SIZE].

[mklinden2010]

>>True. And that's exactly why the kid's Mom freaked out. cd-ing is not normal. It's considered a shameful thing. Whether it is or not isn't the point here. Society's attitude won't be changing anytime soon.
And to whomever: please don't run that old cd routine of "it's society's problem, not ours" because that's not true and you know it.
This thread has reached almost a 100 posts for what?
It's a no-brainer. Stay out of this situation.


Mom is freaked out probably because that's how this Mom handles stuff... Another Mom might have said, "A party? Why didn't you tell me? Who else is coming and do we have enough chips?"

CDing is as normal as it gets; this is life. And, "shameful" to some, not all. Denial's normal too. So is hysteria. Which one is healthier?

Well, that depends. Each serves a purpose, when you get down to cases. Which boat do you want to be in in this life - which one do you want to help row and in what mood?

So, OK, you stay out of this and offer your position for everyone to con-sid-er. That's fine - one gal, one vote.

However, to put and end to this thread, send me the address and phone number of these folks and I'll go chat the family up.

Why not be normal about all this? You want support, help, information, tips? I got all that.

Glad to share.

[Rachel Morley]

There are a couple things on my mind about this situation and that is: Do we know what is the root cause of the problem is as far as the Mom is concerned? I mean to say, is it that her son might be gay or is it that he's a crossdresser, or is it something else like she feels bad that her son didn't feel comfortable enough to tell her? My point is, if it made her cry it must be important to her. If you out yourself and somehow she has a dislike for cding you might change the relationship between your wife and her friend.

If on the other hand it's all about her son being gay (or so she thinks) maybe she's homophobic and whether her son is gay or not, telling her that you dress isn't going to change anything in that regard.

IMHO there are too many unknowns to start sharing private information about your life with this Mom. If we knew for sure the problem for her was was only about not wanting to accept that her son likes to dress up then maybe it would be fine to tell her about you, (if you know she can be trusted not to tell other people) but if you do tell her, I'd ask your wife to do the talking and somehow let her friend know that cding can happen within families and its not all bad. In other words it hasn't ruined your relationship so it shouldn't ruin her's with her son.

[Shelly Preston]

The wife is in the ideal position to help this woman and her son

She has no need to out anyone She can be supportive to the Mother and explain what crossdressing is all about
She has had time to do some research which she can help the mother with as she is obviously worried and has some questions
I am sure she can explain what she know from an objective point of view

She has probably asked all the questions herself in the past so will understand the situation

I agree with those who say Guy n heels does not need to get involved, nor should he other than helping his wife with information

[SusanCACD]

I for one am dying to find out what has happened since then. I can only wish the young man the best and hope he is coping better than I did.

Susan

[Karen564]

My advise to you is, do Not be directly involved in this matter..

But you can help your wife out by getting her some information & resources for Her to give to the the boy's mother, and then be done with it..there's no reason for you to have direct contact with the boy or mother..

What ever happens after that is a personal family matter between the mother & her son...

[Angie G]

I may be to late but if not Maybe you could offer some info on dressing like it don't make the person gay or want to become a girl . You and your wife can do this without coming out to her. Your coming out may make her feel she has nowhere to go for help.
Angie

[guynheels]

I thought I would post an update to what was happening next door. My wife spoke to our neighbor yesterday afternoon and she is now thinking about packing he son up and moving him in with his father out of town! I have met his father and I know why he is not a big part of their life because the guy is quite frankly, a jerk! According to my wife she feels that the reason things are the way they are is because he does not have a father figure in his everyday life. She has not told him about the boy dressing up but thinks that living with his father will make it go away. My wife told her that she should go online and research the subject or seek professional help before she did anything rash but I don't know if it helped. As I said, this is really a mess. I will let you know more when I hear something.

[Gerard]

I thought I would post an update to what was happening next door. My wife spoke to our neighbor yesterday afternoon and she is now thinking about packing he son up and moving him in with his father out of town! I have met his father and I know why he is not a big part of their life because the guy is quite frankly, a jerk! According to my wife she feels that the reason things are the way they are is because he does not have a father figure in his everyday life. She has not told him about the boy dressing up but thinks that living with his father will make it go away. My wife told her that she should go online and research the subject or seek professional help before she did anything rash but I don't know if it helped. As I said, this is really a mess. I will let you know more when I hear something.

Whoa. Sounds like very much an over-reaction that will end up hurting everyone even more. If the mother loves her children and knows the father is a jerk, then she's only going to hurt herself and the people she loves if she does this. Still people do that all the time if they see no good solution.
Ask her if she thinks she'll be happier and if her son will be happier with this solution. Does her son enjoy living with her and his sister? A solution that ends up with everyone feeling miserable can't be good. It needs more time to come up with a better one.

It's going to be hard to convince the neighbour if she's acting that way though. I think she'll end up hurting herself and her children if she goes through though, and experience here tells that it's almost certainly not going to "fix" things. I'd suggest being a bit more bold, if you (or your wife) can, in persuading her, I think it would be a very sad outcome.

I would at this point not try to communicate with the boy directly. The mother needs to feel in control and she is the parent. I'm not sure what I would do if he ends up being sent to his dads place. I agree with a lot of people here that if would have helped me too, if I had known at an earlier age that I was not alone. I would certainly consider something like an anonymous letter or something, if things didn't work out otherwise.

[mklinden2010]

1)

Funny how all the gay and lesbian people on the planet had mothers and fathers, yet turned out the way they did anyway.

2)

I'm neither one or the other, but I crossdressed from a young age and never thought much about it - it was just something "I" did and my own observations of life taught me that it wasn't really that big a deal. So, I just did what I wanted to do anyway.

3)

Crossdressing, like much gay and lesbian activity, is often impossible to detect unless someone wants to be "out." It's nearly impossible to detect because it's irrelevant to nearly everything.

Do you think a hungry lion cares if you're gay, or, crossdress, or, both? Does money crawl out of your purse and back into your wallet out of shear disgust? Do people care enough about what you do that they search your house and car daily to see what YOU might be up to?

No, no, and no. Doesn't matter, doesn't happen, and, (normally) too much trouble and you're not bothering anybody anyway.

4)

But... Here goes another Jew, I mean, kid, shipped off to a concentration camp, I mean, crummy Dad's home, so that he can be cured of something that's just who he is - by a Nazi, I mean, Dad, who's probably clueless about what to do anyway - or, life would be different for that entire family.

Yeah, take him, take them, I'll just stand here on my doorstep and figure they'll leave when the truck is full and not come back.

Makes me wanna shout, "Gay Pride!" and go rescue the kid.

It's better than doing nothing - and waiting for the knock on my door...

[TxCassie]

The mother is correct. The dressing probably will stop, not because the fatherly figure "cured" him but because the femm side of the boy will be so scared, he will put her deep deep away. Once he does that, he will either throw himself into being the butchest, baddest macho boy he can be or become quiet, withdrawn, depressed, and unsure of himself. Either way, his self-identification foundation will be shakey at best.

If he does so happen to continue dressing, and his dad cathes him, well, I don't see anything good coming from this type of scenerio. Of course, GnH says the father is a jerk, let's hope not. But, we all know the odds are against the father being open and accepting from the accounting GnH gave us.

Lets hope the boy's mother will take twice before she moves him away. If GnH's wife can convince the mother to talk to her son, be open, and just take it one day at a time.

Keep us up to date GnH. and Good Luck. Be Wise.

Cassie

[MichelleP]

GuynHeels,

Based upon your posts and FWIW, please remember that your neighbor is attempting to "help" her underage son (no matter how misguided we as outsiders may find that help to be). Please don't underestimate the love of a mother for her children either. If your neighbor does not wish to seek information from the internet or a counselor/therapist as your wife has suggested, your neighbor may be unwilling to accept information from any source on this personal family matter. As onerous and closed-minded as this sounds, there is little that can be done by you or your wife except to offer counsel when asked. As chivalrous and good-natured as it sounds, an introduction of you as a crossdresser will most likely be met with suspicion and you will be percieved by your neighbor as a potential threat and not as a well-adjusted outsider there to offer their help.

Getting involved with interpersonal family issues involving a minor is very risky...

Michelle