What didn't stop you??

[Tinkerbell-GG]

Tink's Thought of The Week:

(Just so you all know, I'm doing this for struggling GG's everywhere who sit there with these inane and endless thoughts in their head and just want to ask someone, ANYONE, who gets it. So I'm asking them on their behalf.) Now to the question:

I'm a mom of young kids (boy included) and I know from personal experience and the ever available parenting book that little boys try on girls clothes. It's common, harmless, and a part of childhood curiosity.

Until it's not.

At some point, boys realise these are not their clothes and they feel wrong wearing them. My H felt this, yet he continued anyway. I've read many here saying they knew it was wrong, they felt it was wrong, yet still they continued until one day wearing the clothes felt right.

So my first question is: Why, at such a young and impressionable age (most here were children, I believe) did you ignore all the social cues that it was wrong and kept dressing anyway?

Second, do you think it's possible you kept crossdressing because it was considered socially wrong?

Are you rebels??

[Marcelle]

Hi Tink . . . hmm . . . let me ponder this

Well from my own experience which seems to be a bit different from others, I do recall as a young boy questioning why I could not wear a pretty dress to school and my mom saying because boys don't wear dresses. Now at such a young age while it seemed my mom must know what she was talking about (she was my mom after all) it still did not resonate with me as logical (well as much as a five year old understands logic). But I accepted that fact and put on my pants. However in the back of mind I still wondered what it would be like to dress pretty. I don't think at that age we (humans) understand all the social taboo rules of dressing or gender play we just bounce around and figure it out as we go along . . . kind of like Bandura's Social Learning Theory. I see boys (who are like me) dress and act a certain way and I mimic. However perhaps for some . . . we look at boys and mimic but part of us looks at girls and wish to mimic. In my case I believe I locked that away in the recesses of my psyche and when Isha made her debut last year, all that information was there. For boys who continue I don't think it is so much being a rebel but more that the Social Learning phase picked both genders to mimic and that becomes ingrained. Not saying this is the sole reason for CDing but I am sure it is buried in there somewhere will all the other hypothesis about why we dress.

Hope this helps

Hugs

Isha

[NancyJ]

Tink, Times have certainly changed and I doubt that any parenting book in the 50's mentioned that boys dressing in girls' clothes was a normal developmental step. I remember wanting to wear girl things as a young boy, but being fearful of doing so due to the tremendous taboo and worry that it was a "sin." (Catholic grade school). I did not first put on female clothing until I had the courage as a teenager to do so, and I had started to question some of the repressive messages I had been taught. Then, once I did so (wore female clothes) the power of doing so was overwhelming and compelling. It was exciting, arousing, and calming all at once. So maybe yes, there was some rebellion against strict social norms, but that was not a motivating factor. If I could have chosen to never have these feelings I would have chosen that. My desire to crossdress has caused me more heartache and consternation than joy. I just want to be free and accepted. I didn't stop because it is who I am. Nancy

[Rhonda Jean]

I don't think I ever had a sense that it was wrong. I guess that because long, feminine hair was allowed or encouraged, I never got the idea that wearing girl's clothes was "wrong". I didn't want to be made fun of. That was probably my biggest motivation to not do it more openly. Even when I was very young, there were some things that it seemed worth occasionally risking ridicule for. Earrings comes to mind (this was mid 60's). So what kept me from going further back in those formative years? Fear of ridicule. Why didn't I stop? Once I could drive, and even more so when I moved away, the fear of ridicule went away along with the possibility of being recognized. So, I never thought it was wrong, which is probably why I never experienced the guilt that a lot of us do.

[Jane P]

Could be it felt right , right from the start but we were told it was wrong , conditioned to believe it was wrong , made to feel guilt because of this conditioning but kept doing it because to a part of us it still just felt right. We continued to hide it away because of societal conditioning.
It's funny how it isn't wrong in the beginning. I recall being dressed up by my sisters when I was maybe 4 and receiving positive feedback , teasingly I suppose but hearing all the " well don't you look pretty and such" comments which are eventually replaced by " boys don't do that . At the time there were things that girls didn't do , but those things have been proven to be nonsense because girls can do anything boys can do.

[Hell on Heels]

Hell-o Tink, I don't recall anyone ever telling me it was wrong, somehow I felt it to be wrong though, otherwise I would not have dressed in secret. It was fun and exciting, and it was me.
I may have been the rebel child of the family, 1 brother, 2 sisters, but dressing was still a secret. If I really wanted to be a rebel, I could have dressed for the whole family to see.
Much Love,
Kristyn

[Mollyanne]

When I first tried on a garter belt, stockings and panties it was a "experimental thing" that soon became a thrilling, sensational method. I knew that boys did not do this but it was exciting and felt really good to feel the nylon on legs, and the satin on my torso. I also felt that I was the only one doing this, later did I realize that this was not the case. When the word "wrong" is inserted into something that there is a need to do IE: CROSS DRESSING then "wrong" becomes the norm and guilt follows thereafter. If I am wrong for dressing as a woman then I am wrong but I am going to do it anyway.

Molly

[kimdl93]

The perspective you offer suggest that there comes a time when kids learn that "cross dressing is wrong' and stop for that reason. I think this is a mistaken belief. Kids role play for fun, but also to try out gender roles. Many little boys wear girls things, but stop, not because it is deemed socially wrong. They stop because it doesn't interest them personally. In contrast many of us, myself included, were actively discouraged from exploring these roles in the form of clothing by the fear of being as you say, socially wrong.

Your question suggests that the cross dressing behavior is learned and at some point becomes a choice to disregard social norms. I would very strongly submit that most of us did quit dressing and conform to 'socially correct behavior.' We responded to the pressure of parent or sibling or other such influences and repressed the desire to express our gender identity.

[BLUE ORCHID]

Hi Tink, For the last 67 years it has just been something that I enjoyed doing.

[Kate Simmons]

Not sure Hon. I was a rough and tumble boy for sure but somehow it always seemed to be a part of myself that I didn't question, it just was. It took me some 50+ years to finally begin to understand that it was really about deep feelings(at least for me). Then I was finally able to manage it.

[jessie1209]

When I first started dressing it had to do more with the sexual feeling and even though I knew it was wrong I felt sexy and beautiful.

[MsVal]

As one that came late to the party, I am not among your target audience. However I suggest that juvenile crossdressers may be driven by some of the same motivations that drive other children to raid mom's secret stash of candy. Ie: it is enjoyable, and the reward outweighs the risk.

Best wishes
MsVal

[Laurie A]

Tink,

The answer to the first question is simple for me, it was a compulsion, and at a young age, impulse control rarely exists. I still have no idea why I started...

The second question, for me, no it was not an act of rebellion, in fact I was deeply ashamed and would have been mortified if ever found out.

I will say that I learned to be devious, hiding this secret from my parents and siblings. This type of deceit developed into other patterns of behavior later in life that I am not proud of. Which then made the whole issue painful for me to even think about during my teens and early adult years.

[Ressie]

I'm not too sure of the premise that it's common for boys to try on girl's clothes. Then at some point discover that it's wrong and stop? Is this what Dr. Spock said or is it another book? I just never thought it was common, but it would be difficult to really find out. If a poll was taken how many men would admit they tried on girl's clothes as children?

Common or not, in my case my mom discovered I was wearing silky panties at around age 7 or 8 and I got the message it was wrong. They fit perfectly because they were doll's panties and they felt wonderful, but I stopped wearing them.

Somewhere around the start of puberty (~5 years later) I wondered what would happen if I tried on my sister's dress. It turned out to be intense sexual arousal and simply became something that had to repeated. Trying on other articles was inevitable throughout the next few years and frankly, there was shame involved. But it was just too exciting to stop.

[Tinkerbell-GG]

Your question suggests that the cross dressing behavior is learned and at some point becomes a choice to disregard social norms.

Actually, I was just pointing out the typical path this takes and asking why some boys continue on with it while others don't. My idea was some might indeed be rebels, enjoying the social taboo of it all. We girls get to wear what we like by pushing social norms. Why not boys?

But you've also shown the innate side to some here, that leads a boy along an already mapped path. Did you also feel 'wrong' about your CD at the beginning? Or was there always a deep sense that it's right no matter what anyone else says? Because a part of me thinks the male biology you all carry shuns CD even when your heart says otherwise. It's a reflex or something. Just an observation.

Thanks for answering everyone. Remember, just learning and sharing here. Not judging at all. I just want to ask the questions of those on the outside so that we might better understand xx

Edit: Ressie, one of the latest parenting books for boys at the moment mentions this curiosity (no, not Dr Spock who is now considered a dinosaur! lol) and I'm pretty sure many moms have witnessed it. I picked my son up from preschool two years back and ALL the boys had decided to wear tutus for the day. They thought it was hilarious! Every one of my friends and my sisters with boys who also have sisters have tried on skirts, mom's heels, nail polish etc. Given the percentage of these boys who will actually continue crossdressing, (5%?) then yes, I'd say it's a common curiosity for boys in general.

[samantha rogers]

Tink, it is pretty simple...on the streets where I grew up the least sign of weakness got you beat up. Simply standing wrong or not acting like a tough guy jerk would have you labeled as a "poof" and life would effectively end. The world has still not changed in many places.
People forget so easily, but this thing we do...this "thing" that makes us unique and special and beautiful...this thing can get us killed.
Sigh

[Sc0rp10N]

I never tried on mom's panties, my sister was younger and her clothes would not have fit if I'd had the urge to try them on, which I didn't, I thought cross dressers were all gay, weird, etc. While growing up. Even in high school, a friend started and I summed it up that he was an attention hog. I never felt or wanted this. And then I did. And i was embarrassed both for liking it and for not previously being understanding, my attitudes changed. 99% of the reason for me is sexual and I have been kind-of a nympho from an early age. Nothing hasn't stopped me from dressing because I have only recently started and have never tried to stop, but I'm very compartmentalized in life and it has its place and time. ... Oh yeah, and completely aside from this, I have always been a rebel, so CD-Ing would SEEM to go along, but it doesn't... Punk rocker with Mohawk, vegan before it was cool, anarchist, atheist, musician, artist, etc. All things rebellious in my youth, what's funny today is that many of my attitudes have become more traditional, which also, now, seems to be the rebellious attitude... ;-)

[Christen]

Hi Tink,

First question; for me it was never the common, harmless part of childhood curiosity. Well, I don't think it was. I've memories from well before I ever slipped on that first item of girl's clothing, a cardigan, at the age of maybe 7, of feeling different, to what I'm not even sure. I remember being in the choir stall at church looking over the congregation, I was, say somewhere around 5, and wishing I could be dressed like some of the girls my age that I could see. I knew it considered wrong to wear girl's clothing before I ever did it, even at such a young age. I borrowed items of my sisters and wore them secretly. I made up stories to cover strange occurrences , such as my sisters briefs being found tucked in my sheets. But why? Maybe I thought girls had a better deal. Although that doesn't make a lot of sense given the age when this desire made itself known to me. So the why question is still unanswered for myself.

Second question; when I think of the anguished nights with silent tears, the depressed periods, the turmoil and agony crossdressing has given me because I knew and believed it was socially wrong, No, I didn't keep doing it for that reason.

Am I a rebel? Heck Tink, I don't even wear brightly coloured socks.

Christen x

[hope springs]

Late blooming CD here so i dont have a ton of early CD experience. However, the few times in my adolescence i crossdressed, it didnt feel wrong at all. Just different. I certainly wasnt rebelling, i was just genuinely curious.
But..... ive always lacked that small voice in my voice that says dont do something because others might not like it. That internal nagging that keeps societal norms part of your thought process, yeah... dont have that. Never did. Thats probably has way more to do with my accepting CD than rebelliousness.
I didnt keep dressing because it was never at the fore of my thoughts. When i admitted i wasnt whole i accepted CDing and felt much better.
Thanks for such great questons

[Bryanne]

I began dressing at an early age, and although I felt guilt, I enjoyed it, and it felt right to me. It was another interest of mine, like movies or music or building model airplanes. As I began to lose some interest in it, I told a friend about my dressing one day, and she encouraged it in a supportive, and occasionally sexual way, which I don't believe hurt the situation in a "I feel guilty" way. Having that reward for it strengthened my urge to dress and get better at it. Later in life, it would haunt me, as I didn't find a girl who was into it, and buried those urges, only to find them again following the divorce.

I would suppose, then, that what did not stop me was a combination of a relationship that rewarded my dressing at a very impressionable point in my life, and some form of a creative outlet to improve at something, in this case, presenting as an attractive woman. Taking this further, I wish that I had never stopped, or let go of the young lady who brought it out of me like that. Regret is a terrible thing to shoulder.

I think that, unless dressing has some detrimental effect on one's life, say missing work, skipping-out on responsibilities and more, that it should be embraced as an interest and hobby, and nurtured in some way. If some men can have boating or collecting classic autos as a hobby because it is their interest, what does it matter if my chosen interest is dressing en femme?

[Confucius]

Yes, they know it is socially unacceptable, but they do it anyway. Most experience shame and guilt from cross-dressing during their youth. They hide their cross-dressing with great fear of being found. They think they are the only person in the world with this condition. So why do they do it? Because they cannot make it go away. You need to understand the "cross-dressing is a form of synesthesia" theory.

Stage 1 - The Biology
In your early years of life your brain is undergoing synaptogenesis. This is a critical period of making neural connections. Your brain is forming 700-1000 neural connections per second!!! By the time you are three years old you have many, many more neural connections than at any other point of your life. Then, largely through the learning process, your brain cuts the nonsense connections and reinforces the learned connections in a process called neural pruning. Sometimes connections are maintained that don't seem logical. Synesthesia involves crossing senses. Synesthesia is a neurological condition where activity in one sensory pathway causes an automatic and involuntary response in a second sensory pathway.

Stage 2 - The Psychology
This also involves some of the biology. It concerns the reinforcement of neural connections intrinsic to synesthesia. The person identifies feminine articles (clothing, jewelry, shoes, make-up) with the contact with a female. Any number of associations can be made and it accounts for some of the spectrum within cross-dressing. In most cases it is simply a sensitive young boy wants contact with his mother. He often over-values feminine virtues and sees females as being more favored by society, girls have it better in life than boys, or he may have poor male role models. In some cases the young boy is made to believe that he has to be stoic, tough, competitive, and live up to impossible expectations from his parents. He is told that "boys don't cry", "boys can't hit girls", "don't let the bully push you around", and then they beat on each other to establish dominance... However, girls are seen as being valued simply for their appearances. In any event, the young boy believes that girls get a free pass in life, and have much less stress, and enjoy pretty things and enjoy gentle play.

Stage 3 - The Trigger
At this point their brain has neural connections already in place. They perceive girls as being socially privileged. All they need is a trigger, and for most this means they experiment with cross-dressing. They will usually vividly remember their "first time", like an explosion going off in their brain. They often report this first experience as being highly exciting, stimulating, addicting, and causing their body to be shaking all over. What is happening is that their brain is interpreting cross-dressing as actual contact with a female. Their brain immediately releases a host of neurotransmitters (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin) which produce the sensations of well-being, comfort, pleasure, sexual gratification and bonding. Many report the sensation as a "rush". It affects the reward centers of his brain, instant gratification, and thus it mimics the addiction response. No, you can't make your brain stop releasing neurotransmitters. However by doing the same thing over and over it does cause the brain to fatigue and release less dopamine, and the cross-dresser will feel a need to vary the experience to keep his dopamine levels high.

About the brain interpreting cross-dressing as actual contact with a female: The cross-dresser will experience this automatic and involuntary secondary sensory experience and will need to understand it as either internalized, or externalized. If he internalizes the "contact with a female" sensation it will mean that he thinks that somehow the female is inside of himself. If he externalizes the "contact with a female" sensation it will mean that he sees himself as just a "man in a dress", and cross-dressing is just a compulsive mystery. This internal/external concept is largely responsible for the spectrum found in the cross-dressing community.

Testosterone? Yes, testosterone is important. It is associated with our sex drive. So when we reach puberty and the testosterone levels rise quickly, then the "contact with a female" sensation will be very sexually stimulating. Usually cross-dressers report that before puberty their cross-dressing was fun and freeing, but not sexually stimulating. Also later in life when their testosterone levels wane then cross-dressing is not so much sexual, as it is comforting, and reduces stress.

Another biological concept that should be noted is childhood amnesia. Researchers report that when we get around 7-9 years old we lose almost all our memories of our first three years. For the cross-dresser this means that any female envy he may have experienced in early childhood may be corrected and forgotten before he reaches adolescence. However his neural connections are still there, and all he needs is the trigger. His cross-dressing may be a complete mystery to him. In the end all he knows is that cross-dressing makes him happy.

That in a nutshell, is the "cross-dressing is a form of synesthesia" theory. I hope this helps.

[Kate T]

At some point, boys realise these are not their clothes and they feel wrong wearing them. My H felt this, yet he continued anyway. I've read many here saying they knew it was wrong, they felt it was wrong, yet still they continued until one day wearing the clothes felt right.

This is not the way I would describe how I felt. I KNEW it was socially wrong but it ALWAYS FELT intrinsically right.

So my first question is: Why, at such a young and impressionable age (most here were children, I believe) did you ignore all the social cues that it was wrong and kept dressing anyway?

Second, do you think it's possible you kept crossdressing because it was considered socially wrong?

Are you rebels??

Childrens behaviour certainly up until the age of 10 yrs (and for most until much older) is essentially driven by 2 things. Firstly what they like and feel is right, and secondly by their desire for love and acceptance (usually in the form of praise or affection), typically from parents. Very few children are driven in their behaviour by a desire to rebel against society.

Assuming that most parents do not provide additional praise or affection on their child when they are cross dressing versus when they are not cross dressing then the only real explanation for the child to continue cross dressing is that they like it and it feels right to them.

So as much as I would like to claim to be a young rebel I most certainly didn't continue cross dressing as a rebellion against a social norm.

Doesn't mean that I can't make up for it now though .

[Jenniferathome]

...

So my first question is: Why, at such a young and impressionable age (most here were children, I believe) did you ignore all the social cues that it was wrong and kept dressing anyway?

Second, do you think it's possible you kept crossdressing because it was considered socially wrong?

Are you rebels??

Tink, im going to ask my wife to reply as well as she has a particular expertise in this area but I will jump in for now.

first, while as a 7 or 8 year old, I knew it was "wrong" for boys to wear girls clothes, it felt right. Wearing the clothes never felt bad. The guilt or bad feelings resulted from having to hide.

Second, no, cross dressing is not a social commentary. If that were the case, we'd be open about it. You can't make a social comment in a closet. I believe if it were considered socially acceptable, we cross dressers would still dress just without the guilt.

[bridget thronton]

The reason for stopping was they were not my clothes (they were my mother's when I was young or my wife's when I started again and wearing them without permission seemed wrong to me). Once I started buying my own clothes I did not feel i was doing anything wrong (I was not hiding things from my family either).

[Cheryl T]

Firstly, I NEVER felt that it was wrong!
What I did feel was that others felt it was wrong. To me it seemed (and always has) perfectly natural!

Secondly, no I have never done this to go against the social grain. This is all about ME and how I feel. It has nothing to do with anyone else, what they perceive or expect, or how what they think may try to influence me.

I feel complete, whole, unified now that I have freed myself of all those pressures others have tried to impose on me. This is and always has been about ME!!!