Pride and prejudice

[dancinginthedark]

I don't want to personalize this too much since that what I find myself doing frequently on this forum but I don't see any way to avoid it here.
I was VERY unhappy about who I was. I hated that I liked dressing up, I tried like hell not to do it for so long even though I had been doing it since I was 5 years old. This caused GREAT distress in me and eventually depression and suicidal thoughts. After seeing a therapist for a while I've started to accept myself and let me tell you this - it's the honest to god truth - I feel like I'm LIVING instead of GOING THROUGH THE MOTIONS OF LIFE for the first time since I was a small child. I Know that's sad sounding but it's the truth.
Maybe you should suggest therapy for your husband. It could help him accept this in himself too.
Like I said, I personalized it but it's worked for me and would like to believe that it would work for others in similar stuations.

Well kiddo I think all of our opinions tend to be personalized. I have suggested hubby do counseling in the past but intend to bring it up again. From what I understand he has been dressing since a very young boy and has done so every year with some variance in the freqency. Until he confided in me about wearing ladies wear he did not assosicate this with being a CD. I spoke with him for quite some time before he could even say the words, "I am a Crossdresser." He didn't like it. And he surely didn't like me at that moment either since it was me who said the words first when I said so you are a crossdresser then. ewwwwwwww the look on his face was not pleasant when he heard me say those words. I was not being judgemental but that was the only term I knew to apply to his behavior as I knew it from the little he said. I am happy to read that counseling has enabled you to move forward in life. It gives me hope. Thank you for taking the time to talk with me.

[dancinginthedark]

I agree. I know that when I see my boys acting "girly" I do all that I can to discourage it, and my wife occasionally gives me the "like you should judge this?" look. I don't do it because I want to pick on them for MY issues, but because this lifestyle puts a person through years of hell, instability, and collateral relationship damage until you come to terms with it. I don't want them to suffer the same grief I've suffered over the years.

Maybe that's the wrong approach; in doing that, we're causing them to repress their curiosities and self-expression that may otherwise simply be temporary detours... creating things that may come back to haunt them later. Perhaps what we should be doing is finding them a different outlet through which they can express this element of themselves.

I apolgize Michelle I think I forgot or missed you somehow. I think your post says it well and voices some of my own fears where you say what I highlighted in bold. Thanks for sharing and the time you took to do it.

[simonep]

No its not me, just like the picture and the lingerie. We all have to have our fantasies..

Love Simone

[dancinginthedark]

No its not me, just like the picture and the lingerie. We all have to have our fantasies..

Love Simone

Simone,
Oh. Okay kewl. Mine isn't really me either.

[flatlander_48]

Before I add my 2 cents, I want to recognize the folks on the forum. It feels very good and very reassuring to me to notice the degree of kindness and collective intelligence that is displayed here. Truly remarkable...

Anyway, in thinking about the behaviors that have been discussed here, I think about closeted gay politicians who support the DOMA and don't support hate crimes legislation. The public part is the surface of what is going on internally for people. For some, the struggle never gets resolved. For others, people are forced into some degree of resolution because their innermost secrets are suddenly made public. This is unfortunate, but sometimes it happens.

From my own experience, as I was beginning to think about how sexuality applied to me, I noticed that I was very critical in evaluating the appearance and behaviors of gay men and lesbians. It's like I was saying "I'm not like them." as a way of defining my space as different from "those people". In other words, it is like playing out self-delusion while trying to run away from the truth. What I eventually realized was that I had some of those traits and behaviors that I saw in effeminate men and butch women. Not everything, but enough to begin to understand that I was a collection of some very disparate thought processes. What I also came to understand was that having a range of thoughts and feelings wasn't bad, but it sure was confusing. The confusion part is perhaps the most difficult. We want things to come together in nice neat packages, but dealing with anything even remotely related to sexuality is usually the opposite of nice and neat.

If we are fortunate, the significant people in our lives are also ones who can see through the B/S that we are throwing out while we are busy being confused and in denial. Aberrant behavior is just that and doesn't reflect our true selves, but sometimes it is very easy to forget that.

[melissacd]

It took me 36 years to admit to myself that it was okay to be a cross dresser. It has taken the last 2 years to get used to the fact that rationally I have given myself permission to be who I am. In as much as we want to be who we are, many of us are ashamed of it anyway. There is still a big struggle going on inside. Many years of repression and shame are hard to get past even when someone we love is accepting. It is even harder when someone we thought we loved is sort of accepting in a non-supportive way (try and make sense of that statement) . There are many walls and barriers that have to be dismantled. This is not something that anyone gets past in an afternoon, this takes years of reflection, actions that build confidence, positive feedback, support and acceptance. This is a major re-programming exercise.

[bgirl]

My My MY! Hello Mae! I would bet he judges himself as harshly as he judges others. Before I was able to say that I was a crossdresser, cross-gender people of any degree made me squemish. I didn't do it. No body saw me. You can't prove a thing, man! In my case the absence of denial brings an absence of judgement. I still fight it sometimes. And when I do the judgement always starts with my self. In my better days I embrace all of you, in my bitter days I judge myself harshly, then start with the others. This forum is an excelent place to practice equanimity. Sitting in the absence of judgement.

[vbcdgrl]

This isn't gonna be easy, Mae, but, perhaps your hubby needs to see a psychologist. Not because of the CDing, but because of his inner conflict between "macho" and his "feminine side". He's got to work that out, or he won't be happy.
The fact that he apologized means he at least thought better of his actions later. That's a good thing.


Vikki

[tekla west]

The title of your post got me thinking of my favorite quote by John Ruskin "“In general, pride is at the bottom of all great mistakes.” So hubby needs to suck up the pride and try truth. The truth will set you free after all.

Funny, as I was reading this here over coffee I've got Eddie Vetter (I'm a huge Pearl Jam fan) screaming at the top of his lungs ... "It's evolution baby!"

Could the rise in men crossing these lines be a type of social and cultural evolution? I sure don't need to go past today's headlines to argue that as a race, a species, we best drop a whole lot of the competition, the war/aggression factor, the greed and exploration attitudes that are traditionally considered male if we hope to see the next century.

Are more men becoming "softer," more "gentle" and less "men"? We can only hope and pray that such is so.

Moreover, all of this is not of one kind or type. Some are into a sexual aspect, put on the panties & get off. Others are much deeper into things that 'traditionally' are considered feminine, domestic arts, beauty and child-rearing. And most fall somewhere in-between those two extremes. Before hubby can face this, he has to know it, to know it begins with not lying to himself. That self-acceptance deal again.

As for relations with the kids, he has to be aware that the world has changed, and is changing. Gender is a much more fluid concept now than it was before. Poor Day Tripper, back in the day when women could not take shop, and guys could not take Home Ec. In 1973 I became the first guy to take home ec at my high-school. That was the fall semester. By spring over half the football team had signed up, deciding that a) making brownies was its own reward and/or b) that in a college prep atmosphere an easy A is just that, fodder for the GPA. We would not consider not letting a young woman take shop now, and home ec is not just for girls. All that in a few decades.

Only vaguely off the topic, I run fetish parties now and again and I wonder "What did the people with rubber fetishes do before the invention of rubber?" What did the people who have a deep fetish for frilly lace trimmed lingerie do before the industrial revolution made such items widespread? - Obviously I have too much time on my hands at these events. But again, perhaps its evolution baby. If these people can accept themselves, (and be quite happy in it at that) then why not him? Is a much shorter journey for sure.

As I'm sure many of the gurls and bois here will attest:

“There comes a time when you have to stand up and shout:

This is me damn it! I look the way I look, think the way I think, feel the way I feel, love the way I love! I am a whole complex package. Take me... or leave me. Accept me - or walk away! Do not try to make me feel like less of a person, just because I don't fit your idea of who I should be and don't try to change me to fit your mold. If I need to change, I alone will make that decision.

When you are strong enough to love yourself 100%, good and bad - you will be amazed at the opportunities that life presents you.”

As I stated at the start of the first post, self-acceptance is the only one that matters. Like the recovery deal, it only starts when you can say it. When you accept it.

[Dixie Darling]

The short version of your husband's problem is simply the fact that he has never learned to accept HIMSELF as being a crossdresser. The "front" that he's putting up by being critical of others in the way he's doing is a defense mechanism used to throw others off the scent that HE enjoys dressing enfemme. If he could ever get past the point of admitting to himself that he IS a crossdresser, and begin to accept it, I would imagine that you would see a change in his attitude towards others.

There is also another possibility for his attitude. He's aware of the burdens of being a crossdresser and it could be that he THINKS he can possibly discourage such a choice by his children. Now I'm pretty sure that by now you're aware that none of us are CDs by CHOICE, so the idea that he might be able to head it off by being negative about it isn't going to hold water either.

His idea that CDs are "perverts" in comparison to TS's (who he says at least know what they want and where they're going) would be about as accurate as saying that refrigerators are in big demand by Eskimos. And it may come as a shock to him, but there are a lot more heterosexual crossdressers walking around in our society than there are transsexuals.

Just at a guess I would say that he needs to research crossdressing and if he's not already a mamber here, he needs to join this forum and start learning that there are tens of thousands of CDs who have the same NEED that he does.

Finally, my hat's off to YOU for your understanding and acceptance. Not just of your husband, but for all crossdressers. It takes a very SPECIAL GG to see beyond the feminine finery and recognize that there's a NEED for crossdresser's doing what they do, and you seem to be one of the few who were able to understand this.

Dixie -- http://www.geocities.com/senorita_cd

[sandra-leigh]

His idea that CDs are "perverts" in comparison to TS's (who he says at least know what they want and where they're going) would be about as accurate as saying that refrigerators are in big demand by Eskimos.

Your meaning in that paragraph seems to have gone over my head.

The traditional Inuit nomad way of life is greatly in abeyance -- they are having to make special efforts to record and revive before the elders who still remember the skills and stories die out completely.

The newer Inuit way of life tends to be in more fixed settlements. And yes, they do use refrigerators. During summer it is above freezing and they want their food kept cool, and in winter it is -too- cold out for convenient storage.

The purpose of a refrigerator is not to keep things -cold-, the purpose of a refrigerator is to keep things at a useful temperature, cold enough to inhibit spoilage, but warm enough to not freeze or wilt from the cold.

[dancinginthedark]

Before I add my 2 cents, I want to recognize the folks on the forum. It feels very good and very reassuring to me to notice the degree of kindness and collective intelligence that is displayed here. Truly remarkable...

I agree completely. This isn't just a forum this is my extended family.

From my own experience, as I was beginning to think about how sexuality applied to me, I noticed that I was very critical in evaluating the appearance and behaviors of gay men and lesbians. It's like I was saying "I'm not like them." as a way of defining my space as different from "those people"[...]I had some of those traits and behaviors that I saw in effeminate men and butch women. [...] What I also came to understand was that having a range of thoughts and feelings wasn't bad, but it sure was confusing. The confusion part is perhaps the most difficult. We want things to come together in nice neat packages, but dealing with anything even remotely related to sexuality is usually the opposite of nice and neat.

There is also another possibility for his attitude. He's aware of the burdens of being a crossdresser and it could be that he THINKS he can possibly discourage such a choice by his children. Now I'm pretty sure that by now you're aware that none of us are CDs by CHOICE, so the idea that he might be able to head it off by being negative about it isn't going to hold water either.

Denial, shame, and the confusion linked to them are very hard to over come. One of the reasons I was so quick to come to my son's defense. I know the over the top behavior that was perhaps meant to discourage/stop the possibility of my son gowning into a CD would have no affect to stop that. As Dixie says it isn't a choice, but what is worse here is would this negative behavior towards a child encourage the pain, rejection, and shame seen so often here? I have to believe it would. If they had never been made to feel poorly about themselves in the first place and instead been accepted as the unique and lovable children they were the need for self-acceptance would not be needed ~ it would ALREADY be there. So behavior meant to save a son instead seals the child's fate to that of the father. Just my .02