Trigger Question

[Briana90802]

Just thought I'd ask. We all had that trigger, that one event that made us start crossdressing. DO you think that if that trigger event was removed from your life, or happened differently, you would still have crossdressed?

[Anna H]

Mine goes back so far that I don't know that there was any trigger.

If one could be pinpointed, I'd assume we could all possibly figure
ourselves out?

Whatever happened, I'm glad it did. But then, someone would have
to be one of us to ever understand that...lol!

[mykell]

i think its more than that "trigger event",
when coming to terms with CDing many refer to they're earliest memory or knowing that they're CDers,
therefore if they remembered sooner the event is different, at least in my case this is true, my earliest i remember is age 7, and if the Rockettes never existed i would not live this lifestyle, doubtful, the events memory, probably....

[Abigail Flame]

I didn't have a trigger so much as an series of unveilings followed by an "oh shit" moment. I had always considered myself a fetishist (latex,leather) who sometime played with gender. It wasn't until I started realizing that I was expressing myself that way because (in a strange way) it felt safer. I had started playing with crossdressing because I thought it would a fun and sexy thing to do. The first time I went full on femme it was like someone rang a bell and everything made sense about who I was. Everything before had all seemed to lead to this moment. (I just wish it had been sooner) It seems that is was inevitable.

[Jenelle]

Mine goes back so far that I don't know that there was any trigger.

Same here. My dressing goes back so far I don't know if there was even a trigger.

[Dianne S]

I don't think there was a trigger. I fantasized about wearing girls' clothes from when I was about 5 or 6 years old.

[StephanieJ]

I definitely have a distinct "triggering event", but I knew I was different even before that. Many times since I've thought that even if that event hadn't happened, I'm sure I would still be the same today.

[Helena Gwyn]

Still not fully ok on the inside with CD'ing, but since I started accepting it a few months ago, many early childhood memories have been popping up in my head confirming my CD-desires. Suddenly I remember seeing my younger niece leave for gym practice in a blue shiny leotard wishing I could try that on, I must have been around 8 years old I think. Suddenly I remember Disney movies I saw identifying myself with the female character, wishing to have their long hair, wishing to wear their dresses. I'm sure I'm going to have more of them pop up if I progress.
The first time I tried out a (new) pantyhose (and heels and a swimsuit I think) was when I hit puberty, around 14 or 15 years old. Not much of a trigger, just one of the first times I was allowed to stay home alone while my parents and brother went to some kids party.

[Katey888]

This question ranks right up there with "When did you stop beating your wife..." :facepalm:

"We all had that trigger, that one event that made us start crossdressing..." :eek:

No - as the first few replies have noted...

Where the heck does your assumption come from...???

And - BTW - thanks for sharing what the trigger was for you... :straightface:

If this thread doesn't go anywhere interesting it'll be closed and we can all go back to: "When did you first Crossdress?" which is still open...

:waiting:

Katey

[MustangGirl]

I don't know if this would count as a trigger. I remember my mom dressing me as a girl several times at Halloween. It didn't make me uncomfortable at all, in fact, I don't recall feeling any different than when wearing my boy clothes. At about age eight, I was getting undressed to take a bath, and my mom's bra, and girdle laying on the clothes hamper. I was really drawn to them, and it seemed so natural to put them on, so I did. BANG, from that point on I was hooked. Every chance I got, I was wearing her stuff. I found out later, my mom dressed my as a girl only, for the first 3 or 4 years. I remember getting my first haircut, and my hair was past my shoulders, and I threw a fit about getting it cut.

When dad and mom got divorced, and mom moved out, I no longer had access to female clothes, so the desire went away, I thought. In reality, it had just went dormant, as I would find out after I got married. I again had access to female things, and boy oh boy, my desire to dress came back with a vengeance. I told my wife, and it took awhile for her to come to terms with it, but she finally did, and even helped me pick things, and taught me how to apply makeup, and style my wigs. We would go out together with me dressed, and one time at her company Halloween party, we went as twin witches, and even though most everyone there knew me, no one knew it was me. I even got hit on by a couple of guys.

[Tracii G]

Not sure about a trigger so to speak I think its genetic.

[Stephanie47]

Being older, as in mid 60's, one always reflects on their lives. Sure, I wonder about this affliction. I say affliction because cross dressing has caused unnecessary turmoil in my life. It would have been great not to have acquired the desire to wear women's clothing. Conformity has its rewards. One may express themselves within the acceptable boundaries set by society. During my professional career I was able to express how I felt when I arose in the morning by deciding what color dress shirt I was going to wear and the tie. I have a vast collection of ties that covered a wide range of attitudes for any particular day. I equate my male dress code in the same manner a woman may decide what to wear to work. So, why wear women's clothing? I know the affliction started as a single digit midget. My mother use to hang her nylon slips to dry in the sole bathroom in our apartment. I was intrigued by the different feel of the nylon from my boy clothes. Even wet the slips were alluring. I tried them on. Even when the slips were drying on a line in the hallway of the apartment I caressed them as I passed by the clothesline. The natural progression was to try on her nylon nightgowns. So, why did I not stop right there? Why did I feel it was necessary to try on her bra and girdle and stockings? And, finally her dresses?

I knew it was unacceptable. It caused confusion as a teenager. I had normal reactions to girls. Guys talked about scoring with chicks, whether real or imaginary bullshit. Nobody talked about wearing women's clothing. You knew you were doing something way out of the ordinary. In the 1960's there were two types of men; straight and gay. And, being gay was being totally unacceptable. The terminology for gayness was ugly.

I'm sure 100% of heterosexual cross dressers would love to have had cross dressing expunged from their formative years. There is nothing that I have gained by cross dressing. I read on this forum all the time that some welcome cross dressing and would never have had their lives develop any other way. I don't accept that premise. I, as well as the majority of cross dressers, have survived a life of conflict and turmoil, realizing we (I) have done no evil and have come to grips with cross dressing.

I realize we are all unique. I could easily expunge cross dressing and express my uniqueness in a different manner.

[DebbieL]

I was transsexual pretty much from birth. My bones and brain indicate that my body didn't process the testosterone properly during those first formative weeks. My index finger is longer than my ring finger, my hips are wider, my face is softer. I didn't even have testes until I was 11 (undescended). My brain was female too. I didn't push the other boys, or fight for toys, or fight at all. When boys pushed, I would often end up in the corner before lashing out just enough to make them keep their distance, like girls do. When they took my toys, I would tell the teacher.

So when the girls invited me to their house to play with them, I was already comfortable playing with baby dolls and Barbie dolls. Trading Barbie clothes was natural. So when we traded clothes and they put me in a pretty dress and tights, it wasn't even something I resisted. I remember that it felt nice, like I was being hugged. I felt so calm and relaxed (not aroused).

Unfortunately, the mother of the girl whose house we were in wasn't happy to see me in a dress at all. She told me to put on my boy clothes, and never come back. The next school day, I was not allowed to play with the girls, and when I played with the boys, I was pelted with rocks, punched, kicked, and after school, I was clubbed with sticks.

I dressed again in the middle of the night, because I couldn't sleep. I felt calm and relaxed, and felt good.

I have no doubt that I would have been a cross-dresser and transsexual at some point, and the trigger would have come one way or another. I do think that the reaction of the girl's mother intensified the need to dress, since I had no girl friends anymore, and hated playing with boys. I ended up reading a lot of non-fiction books and tried to find ways to turn myself into a girl.

Perhaps if her mother had not been so hostile and cruel, I would have been able to talk to my parents about it earlier, and more often. Maybe I would have been able to talk to them instead of turning to drugs, booze, and suicide for almost seven years.

[Anna H]

I'm sure 100% of heterosexual cross dressers would love to have had cross dressing expunged from their formative years. There is nothing that I have gained by cross dressing. I read on this forum all the time that some welcome cross dressing and would never have had their lives develop any other way. I don't accept that premise. I, as well as the majority of cross dressers, have survived a life of conflict and turmoil, realizing we (I) have done no evil and have come to grips with cross dressing.



Nope. It was just my little personal secret. I wasn't driven to do anything that'd cause me
any problems or conflict. It certainly wasn't a sexual thing where I'd go caressing alluring
fabrics. I had no clue about anything to do with sex anyway.

I simply felt closer to my perception of what the girls world was. I'd have fit in much
better, but I was what I was. Made the best of it. Kept my secret to myself.

I can't even imagine being all depressed or conflicted about it. It simply was what it was.
I kept it quiet...it was clear it wasn't something everyone felt.

Why did I like it? The way I saw it, I had doubly the personal interest in the world. I wasn't
one of them, but I was much more interested in the girls than all the other boys seemed
to be. And Not in any sexual way, being a very young child. I had no clue about that
until a bit later in life.

I do honestly feel for those who have problems, but we're not all upset about our "gift".

:)

[ClaraKay]

I would have agreed with Stephanie wholeheartedly -- up to about one year ago. My very first CD 'incident' occurred at around the age of 10 or 11 accompanied by a large dose of guilt and shame. I swore it would never happen again, and it didn't until I was in my twenties and married. More guilt more shame, more promises to stop, and several relapses through the years. There were long periods of CD-less living as my sexually took different turns. Then early last year, I was out for a walk one day and found a bag that had been dropped or discarded. It contained some girls summer clothes. It was all that was needed to trigger a renewal of my CD tendencies. It came over me like a giant net from which I could not escape. It was not long after that I decided to face up to my problem. I learned that I was born with a cross gender identity that I subconsciously tried to suppress all my life. Since coming out openly and honestly to my wife and taking steps to relieve my gender dysphoria, I've come to accept who I am without guilt and without shame. I know that I can't reveal my true nature to others around me -- I don't need to or want to. Having the support of my wife, having come to accept myself as I am without remorse, and now finding a whole community of people not unlike me has made me a much happier person. My only regret is that this all happened so late in my life. Clara

[Alexis.j]

Trigger? not sure about exactly when that happened. It was a gradual process over a few years, but I never felt normal my whole life. Was never interested in the "guy" things, mixed better with the girls (in a platonic way). But then again, I always was extremely shy and never revealed any of my inner feelings. And when i did get any "unusual/abnormal" feelings/desires, I just thought of them as wrong and ignored them.
After WAY too many years of misery and not ever finding happiness anywhere in my life, i started exploring this hidden side of me.
Now, is it a blessing? or a curse?

I dont think its a curse, but it sure aint a easy life...

[Karren H]

I suspect mine has something to do with my mothers telling me I was supposed to have been born a girl... again and again... and again... and then when my sister was born.... I started dressing like one... I was 7.... a more recent trigger was my successful treatment for a couple brain tumors.... the medication reawaken my crossdressing with a VENGEANCE! and I can replicate the results by playing with my dosages... strange but not uncommon....

[Rhanda]

I didn't know anything was happening. I just liked to use some of the styles that are for women. I also had been using some makeup for nearly 70 years. No one ever said anything about either. I guess that I had been a respectable member of a prominent family.

My trigger was when a new customer of my retail business called me to tell me that her diseased husband had been a transvestite and was never able to get out of the closet, and she admired me because I was living as I wanted to. I told her that I never considered myself a transvestite but I had no intention to change my lifestyle.

I couldn' get that out of my mind and so I Googled "Transvestite" and hear I am. I don't want to be considered a woman but don't condem thase who have that motivation. I really suport your (and my) right to dress and present yourselves whatever way you like.

Rhanda

[Lorileah]

I remember my trigger well...OK I don't because it was when I was born. Stating that there is a trigger would in effect open the door to getting rid of what many here consider a problem. This sounds a lot like someone trying to figure out why so that they can fix it?

[Jenniferathome]

No trigger for me. Nothing "happened." I was predisposed to cross dressing and didn't need a trigger as I am wired to be this way. I would compare this to being gay. Gay people are gay, there is no trigger that makes them gay and more than that which made me a straight cross dresser.

[Beverley Sims]

I remember many different triggers, "finding a bra in the street," "mothers and fathers" with the girls next door, being made up for a school play, my three housemates dressing me later in life, being a stooge in a fashion parade and being too successful, :) mock weddings, and so it went on...
I wonder if I could have avoided any of the early triggers?

I think I was machine gunned, not triggered. :)

[Zylia]

The fallacy of the single cause, also known as complex cause, causal oversimplification, causal reductionism, and reduction fallacy, is a fallacy of questionable cause that occurs when it is assumed that there is a single, simple cause of an outcome when in reality it may have been caused by a number of only jointly sufficient causes.

Source: Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_the_single_cause)

[dana digs sweaters]

No trigger for me Briana.
Just multiple upon multiple times of crossdressing while young that continued into adulthood.

[Ericaxd]

Same here. My dressing goes back so far I don't know if there was even a trigger.

Same here. One of my earliest memories is thinking that at some point, you chose to be a boy or a girl, and I knew I'd pick girl when the time came. Still waiting.

[Kate Simmons]

I have no doubt in my mind that I would still be the same person I am today, regardless of what may have "triggered" it. The reason is that it is part of who I am and I can't imagine myself any other way really. :battingeyelashes::)

[Rachael Leigh]

I do believe in early childhood where most of our memories are vague had to be where most triggers happened for any of our dispositions to being a CD. I cannot pin point mine but have some ideas why. I do remember wanting to wear girls clothes for as long as I can remember because I really liked how pretty they were. Today that is still how I feel, I love the look feel and style of women's wear and doubt that will ever change. Can I change and not dress? I think yes is the answer but would that mean I still don't want to dress pretty? No it wouldn't so whatever our triggers for some reason we have this need to dress up and for me it's a tough fight that I'm pretty sure ain't worth fighting most days.

[Kayla C]

No trigger for me either.
As far back as I can remember I'd always wanted to be a girl.
I just couldn't figure out why I wasn't!

[Karen kc]

Idont think it was a trigger, I think its genetic also

[Helen_Highwater]

Having a trigger implies you know what made you CD which is different from deciding you are a CD'er and yes will dress in woman's clothing. I have no idea as to why I wanted to CD. I think my head would explode if I tried to work that one out. And I more drifted into it, undies and tights first and the rest is, as they say, history.

[Caden Lane]

I started at three years old. So figuring out a trigger would be nigh impossible.

[Erica Grace]

I've always been interested in both masculine and feminine things. There was never really a trigger in my life to explain why I went out to buy my first dress and all of the makeup and clothes I now have. It was an easier decision to do those things once I found my way to this site over a year ago (didn't sign up until last month). Reading all of the supportive conversations helped me accept myself for me and seek out acceptance of my girlfriend, which I luckily have :) With my newfound acceptance I jumped at the opportunity to embrace my feminine side.

I remember I was staying in a hotel for work for about 7 weeks straight last February. That is when I decided to go out and buy my first female items of clothing just because it was easy and convenient being in a hotel for so long.

~Erica

[Eryn]

The only change I can see in me is that from desire to crossdress to active crossdressing. That is more a question of "straw that broke the camel's back" than it is a trigger. If it wasn't one straw it would have been another.

[Melissa18]

I don't know if you could classify my first time as a "trigger event" . At age 4 or 5 I saw this particular dress hanging in mothers closet, I remember I just had to try it on, and the rest is history!
To answer your question no I would've tried on another dress. I'm also glad I did try that dress on.

[Princess Grandpa]

I don't really know what that trigger was that first set the desire in me. I do know what the trigger was that made me understand I was a cross dresser. Remove that event and I suspect I would still be in a state of denial.

Hug
Rita

[laura.lapinski]

I don't think I had a trigger. I was just attracted to putting on girls clothes and looking at myself in the mirror.

[Lexi_83]

I would say "sort of." I dressed a little as an 8-9yo, didn't really understand why. Then some more as a preteen and early teen. It wasn't until I was a few years out of college and a friends suggested I cross dress for Halloween that I went of the deep end and started going out.

[sanderlay]

My trigger event was... "Boys don't wear girls clothes because..."... when I asked why. However it would not have changed a thing. The real problem was societies rules... "Boys wear this and girls wear that..." Now if those rules were not there I suspect would have gravitated naturally to wearing something androgynous. My desire is hard wired so to speak. Events would not have changed it.

[devida]

I was just looking at some pictures of me when I was 17, a long time ago. I was very obviously femme back then. I just didn't have the words to describe myself. I remember that even then I was wearing so called women's clothes (they were my clothes) in inappropriate settings. I never fit in with the usual gender dictates, which, in fact, my parents were quite worried about ( because they thought I might be, *gasp*, homosexual). But there was no trigger. I was always different. I never fit in. I was proud of that then and I'm proud of it now. Did it, as Stephanie thinks, result in me not being able to partake in the delusions of the conformed.? Yup, and I was happy that I did not to live my life and die in disillusion. I still am now. I live my own life not someone else's idea of what my life should be. I am sorry I just do not understand why I should live a life in which I am not happy to be me.

[kimdl93]

I think that's an unsupportable assumption. Memories are notoriously unreliable...our brain fills in gaps, sometimes with pure fabrication. The seminal event one thinks they recall is often fragmentary, or fiction.

[CynthiaD]

There was no trigger for me. I've always been like this. My earliest memory of crossdressing is when I was three years old, and I may have started even earlier. It took me a long time to figure out that the other boys didn't want to wear dresses and high heels. I tried to suppress it for a while, but here I am!

[BLUE ORCHID]

Hi Briana, At age four or five years of ageI have no idea what caused it, It's just who I am and it's just what I do.

[shawnsheila]

I have vague memories of me putting on my mom's make up and walking in her heels around 4 - 6 years old. Then I remember getting teased by family members and getting told it was "gay" which was bad.
Then I remember at 14, when no one was home, I would dress up in my moms outfits and feel terrible afterwards thinking something was wrong with me, even though I remember praying that by dressing up, I would magically turn into a girl.
then I suppressed it until I was about 19. I dressed up as a woman for Halloween and I love how it felt. Then I suppressed it again until I was about 23 - 25 where I would occasionally wear my wifes nylons under my work clothes.

I don't recall the triggers for those other then I really really wanted to dress.

Finally I started buying clothes in my late 20's and eventually my wife found my stash and freaked out. Fast forward to today, I have my own closet and a ton of shoes plus multiple wigs. My wife is slowing accepting and my current triggers is just waking up every day... I dress at home (I work from home) just about every day in some fashion or another i.e. Wear an oversize girly t-shirt with leggings (bra and panties of course) and walk around my house with heels until its time to pick up the kids from school. there are time i feel lazy / have no desire to dress (lets face it, its a lot of work at times) but lately I have accelerated in my dressing on how often I like to do it.

[sometimes_miss]

Nope. Before I was molested, I was a somewhat normal boy. No gender dysphoria involved. It took someone telling me that I was really supposed to be a girl, that god made a mistake, and that if I was really good that maybe god would fix me and make me a real girl. About seven years of believing that and convincing myself that it was the correct thing to do, to learn how to be a girl, and there you have it, a well screwed up lad who really believed that he was supposed to be a girl. Later finding out that some things in our personality development can become permanent when you go through them at certain ages, the feeling that I'm supposed to be a girl has never gone away, nor has the feeling that I'm supposed to wear girl's clothing.

[flogo920]

At 7 discovered bras in the hamper about the same time I was being ridiculed for needing a bra as I had large breasts. Putting a underwired lacy black satin bra was an almost out of body experience. I did not realize that I fell down a rabbit hole into a strange new world of sensations, intense pleasure, and as expected a taboo for regular society.

The time was not long going to intense pleasure from daily embarrassment and a life of compression shirts- Built like a linebacker I present as a male in a man's suit- Would not dream of inflicting my appearance on others. Find THAT works for me. But the sensual experience is intense I still look in catalogs for the "perfect bra.

Hugs,

Flo

[edith]

I feel like we're maybe misunderstanding OP's question. The way I read it is "what were the circumstances of your deciding to put on girls' clothes for the first time", rather than "what was the single event that caused you to be a crossdresser".

I was five or six years old and saw an episode of Mr Belvedere where the teenage son crossdresses as part of a fraternity initiation. My mind was totally blown and I knew immediately that I had to do it too. This is my first clear memory of crossdressing, and I would say that it triggered whatever was already present in my brain rather than created it.

Clip:
http://youtu.be/QFb1L9XV1yc?t=13s

[Gardener]

I do not know there was a single trigger moment for me. I was a curious boy and from an early age I found my mother's clothes intriguing as they were so different to what I would wear. I guess in time this evolved from handling to wearing and I can clearly recall how eroticising this was. Quite a shock for a young lad! why I should have been so intrigued is another matter.
In my childhood I was separated from my mother for periods of time as she was unwell and I think this had quite an effect. Handling her clothes was a way of being close to her. I am not sure about that as a "trigger", as I was so young, but it seems plausible. Another layer is about lack of comfort with maleness and a strand of thought that life would be better if I had been a girl. I guess that is one of the ways that unformed brains may deal with unhappiness. Interestingly Mum said to me in later life how much she had wanted a girl. Somewhere I have a memory of her saying I was the "daughter she never had". Again, like the separation layer, one is dealing with possibly corrupted memories.

[Krisi]

I don't know of any trigger event. My dressing started many, many years ago and was gradual.

[Teresa]

Hi Briana, I've come in a bit late on this one but I feel like the odd one out after reading the replies, I did have a trigger event, at 4-5 the girl next door was my GF until 10-11 when I started secondary school. When I was about 9 I was attracted to a shapely swimsuit maybe because it suggested it was her body, I was embarrassed about erections and didn't know about masturbation so when I climaxed it was a OMG moment, I didn't know what had happened but it turned out to be the trigger moment, Cding was locked firmly in my brain, it also explains why I have the need to share it.

[ClaireCole]

When I think about this I remember trying on a fancy dress of my Mum's I found in my wardrobe when I was 5 or so. I tried it on lots, and even used it as a "magic trick" and transformed in the wardrobe for my friends. Eventually I was caught and told off, mostly because it was an expensive dress I think.
It was always my choice to put it on, so I guess I was always going to be a crossdresser. If it wasn't this dress, it would have been another one.

[KatieV]

I would have been too young to remember - seriously, the trigger event happened in the womb! I do believe that this is how I came into the world, with an unusual hormonal (im)balance.. And at age three I was already experimenting with my mom's nylons, that I do distinctly remember.

[NicoleScott]

I think there may be lots of triggers. If one (the one) didn't happen, another would have sooner or later.

[Christen]

No trigger here. I don't believe something triggers you. I was envious of girls and what they wore from very early, definitely under 5 years old. But the first time I put on a piece of girls clothing? The opportunity presented itself, no trigger, just an opportunity to see how it felt. If it didn't happen then it would have happened later. No triggers, this has always been with me.

[Allison2006]

I remember wanting to wear tights and pantyhose very early in childhood, maybe even before kindergarten. Didn't actually try them till I was about 14. I would occasionally throw in a pair of my sister's heels but never considered full blown crossdressing till my late teens/early twenties, when I first read stories about other crosdressers, and I guess you could call that my trigger. I think I'd have stumbled across these stories sooner or later anyway, so can't really say I'd have never tried cd'ing if not for that.

[Julia Red]

I did not have any major trigger to start crossdressing, but I did experienced some breakthrough events that created opportunities for further development.

For instance, when my daughter was born and I moved in with my wife (girlfriend at the time). I had the opportunity to get and store my own items without the fear of my parents discovering. Another time was when my wife bought a wig for carnival and I "stole" it. Never wore a wig before that and there were many after. Internet shopping was a major change too.

If were not for these events, my dressing would be much less developed than today, but I don't think that I would never start because the curiosity have always been within me, so sooner or later I would crossdress.

[Sallee]

:)I don't think I had a trigger. It just kind of happened over time I remember toying around trying to make believe I had boobs in the 3rd grade. In the puberty years it was a turn on. Now it is still a turn on only in more of a feel good manner. Kind of like a nice satisfying ski run when all the turns went right and the snow was light and fluffy. After getting out and having a nice afternoon or evening and blending well it just leaves a smile.:)

[Lori Kurtz]

I can't remember any kind of trigger. My dressing started so young, I can't remember when it was. At first I just tried little things with multiple pairs of my own (male) underwear, with the sense that I was doing something naughty and exciting (and, of course, secret), which only years later become a feeling that, looking back on it, I could identify as "sexy." By the time I was 8 or 9, I'd say, I had started experimenting with some of my mother's underwear and stockings and such. It wasn't until my late teens that I achieved anything that even remotely approached a realistic female appearance. So it was a very gradual process, with no big sudden trigger events at all.