Shared Responsibility

[suanne]

To start. If you watch my posts and the few threads I have made you know that I have been dressing for over 50 years and have been married almost 40 of those years to the same woman I have known since we were 11 years old. In those past years I was caught with panties, and pantyhose in a coat pocket by her. When we were married only two years she caught me dressed, and since then I have left some things out that she found. I went through a lot of pain when caught and so did she. When she caught me dressed, well......it was almost the end of the marriage. We worked it out and in time things got better. She hasn't mentioned it again except when I slipped up and left something out and then it was "you up to the old habits again?" I lied. "No" Afraid to fess up. I know she knows. I want to talk about it, but I don't know if she does. It seems to me if she wanted to know more she would ask. I am afraid to go into details with her cause I am afraid of a divorce. Do you think as far as talking about me crossdressing is as much her responsibility as mine? I see so many of us who are in the closet and some have (like me) got caught dressed or left an article of fem clothing out. We always take the blame and rightfully so, but don't you think our SO or wife has some responsibility or should want to talk about this. If she did want to talk I would. I hope I have explained myself well enough to get some good response from you all. I don't want to keep this part of my life to myself. Its kind of like asking a girl out for the first time. You are arfraid she will reject you. As it is now I dress when I can. I like so many want to stop, and just can't seem to "Git er done" I appeal to your emotions on this one. What do you think? I know I am weak when it comes to this truth. I have been in some pretty tough spots in my life and never have I ran from anything except being a cd to my wife. I am really destressed over this. I am so jealous of you who can dress with you wives and can share your cding.

Suanne

[Lissa Stevens]

I don't think you are weak you just don't want to lose the one you love. I am in a similar situation. My wife knows nothing of my being a CD but she has indicated that she is not hip with crossdressers. She makes comments when she sees the subject on tv so I have never told her. I do love her but I am afraid that it will be the end of our marriage. She is very old fashioned in many ways. One day I will probably be caught and I will find out whether MY fears were right or not.
As to whether she should bring it up I would say no. From reading others posts and talking with other CDs I think most women want to know nothing about the subject so unless they catch you they will never bring it up. After all it is our thing, not hers, so if someone brings it up I think it should be us. That is only my opinion and you can take it or leave it.
This has probably not been what you were hoping to hear but maybe the other gurls will have input that will help.

[suanne]

Hi Lissa. Hey...thanks, I appreciate your comments.

Suanne

[Sarahgurl371]

Suanne,
Maybe you have seen my threads on the recent events in my life. We have been having very serious difficulities dealing with all this stuff. One point I would like to make - she may have difficulty in hearing all this after all this time has elapsed. My wife knew that I had "played" around with womens lingerie before meeting her. (I Thought it would go away after marraige). She knew about alot of this stuff about 7 years ago, and was fine with it, but I wasn't completely honest then. It was more about a sexual fetish then, At least I thought so. As the rest came out, Transgenderism that is, one of the things that upset her the most was that I didn't tell her earlier. That in effect, I had been lying to her. So be prepared for that type of reaction, even though she has made some discoveries on her own.

The other problem we have been having, is can she accept who I am? Can she be married to a man who feels female, and wants to be able to experience feminine things for himself? Be ready for that.

As for your original question. Yes I think that a wife, who knows or has some incling, that her husband my have some private issues, has a responsibility to communicate about it with him. She has no more responsibility than he, to bring it up however. In my situation, I will and have accepted the blame for my behavior. My lying by omission if you will. That is my fault. Now that its out on the table however, I would say that she has to take half of the blame for how we have dealt with it all. I am half of this relationship. A relationship made up of two complete people. I bear sole repsonsibility for what I bring into the mix, but only half of how WE deal with it.

If my wife had some "thing". An illness, a birth defect, a genetic predisposition for something, I would say that it is my responsibility as her husband and friend to attempt to learn and understand it. I will probably get it by the GG's for saying this. Let me point out the obvious difference - I choose to hide this for a long time. My reasons why are of no difference. Be prepared for that.

[suanne]

Thanks Tammy. I have been watching your posts. Believe me I watch. You see when I started dressing back in the 50"s things were a little different. I think the big issue was the communication aspect of cding. No one to share with (like you guys). Plus things were looked at differently. Well most of us oldies understand that.

I hope the GG's don't take offense to this thread and your's or anyone's response. I do appreciate you for speaking your heart. :clap: Thanks so much.


Suanne

[Sage GG]

I hope the GG's don't take offense to this thread and your's or anyone's response. I do appreciate you for speaking your heart. :clap: Thanks so much.


Suanne[/QUOTE]

I know it happens but you should not take offense with someone being honest with you. I thought this whole forum was for everyone to learn, not judge or get upset by what someone "shares". You know your wife and how she will react best, trust your own judgment.

I found out after many years of marriage and it happened to be the right time for us so it is going well.If it had happened at a different time or when we were in different palace maybe it would not have worked out so well.

Sage

[Joanne08]

Suanne, I know you've been reading my thread and subsequent posts, so you know I've gotten a lot of support and advice. The best advice I can pass along is to be prepared for a discussion with your wife by having information to educate her about Cross Dressing. I'm finding that my wife has a lot of predjudices about cder's and I think a basic understanding of the terminologies, definitions, opinions of professionals, your habits, frequencies of dressing would be good to have once you engage her in a conversation. I also was told to let her know how important this is to you. BTW, my opinion is that as long as she doesn't know or doesn't want to she has no responsibility to you for your cding. As a wife it should be her responsibility to care and love you for who you are. I'm struggling with this aspect now. Getting to that conversation is the difficult part. My wife figured it out and confronted me. It was not very comfortable until I said, "I am a CROSS DRESSER" to her and then it got a little easier. Lastly it takes time, lots of time for a wife who finds out to get used to it.

PM me if you'd like to talk further. Best of luck to you. I hope I helped.

Love, Jo

[kathy gg]

If I read this post correct this is your main question:
"Do you think as far as talking about me crossdressing is as much her responsibility as mine? I see so many of us who are in the closet and some have (like me) got caught dressed or left an article of fem clothing out. We always take the blame and rightfully so, but don't you think our SO or wife has some responsibility or should want to talk about this"


I think wishing to lay *some* blame in her direction right now probably helps aleviate some guilt that you have about not ever coming totaally clean when you have had several opportunities.

And that is cool, no body likes to be the bad guy (or is that girl?). People feel better when they dont' have to be 100% responsible for their unhappiness in life. Everyone feels this way at some moment in their life. What you are feeling is human. Congratulations on not being a robot.

I have talked to so many women and even when the crossdressing writing has been crystal clear on their bedroom walls, they dont' get it. They might think kinky fetish (insert item that they caught guy with), weird sexual masterbation techinque, anything but what it is. Many of the women I have talked to never saw it coming. Sure there are clues, but adding up all those parts to equal ...crossdresser. Not even a word most knew exsisted.

What I believe you are basically saying is that she should meet you half way and get the full truth out of you. She should take the initative and get you to fess up. Put the hot light on you and make you sing like a bird.

I think you are assuming alot about her assesment of you.

I also get this feeling that she is of an age where having to deal with anything off the beaten path is probably not how she envisioned her golden years playing out; I think even *if* (and that is a huge IF) she has a full concept of what you are, she will probably continue ignoring it.

Sometimes knowing is more scary than not knowing.

You asked for input and there is mine. Honest, to the point, and no B*ll.
______________________________
And ps...

please don't think I am some bitter chick with an ax to grind, I looked for a crossdresser.

[Holly]

Suanne, I don't think it is fair for you to try and make the responsibility of discussing your CDing your wife's. In my opinion, if this is bothering you so much, then it should be up to you to open the discussion with her. You said that she discovered you dressed a couple of years into your marriage and that, though difficult, the two of you were able to work through if and stay together. That's a plus. You go on to say that in subsequent years when she had discovered some of your things that you lied to her when asked if you were up to your old habits. That's a minus... and a big one. Now you've created the issue of trust that is going to have to be dealt with. I'm sure you've read the posts that have been made that say often the trust issue is bigger and more difficult to overcome that the actual issue of CDing itself. And the longer the deception goes on, the harder it is going to be to overcome.

You named this thread, "Shared Responsibility." I think you're right. You are both obligated to discuss this. But I think it is up to you to initiate that conversation. It's your issue because it is the result of your actions. And it's your guilt that is causing it... not the guilt of dressing, but the guilt of hiding it from her and lying about it. It's not the dressing that's wrong, Suanne. If there's any blame to be made here, it would be your lack of faith in your wife of almost forty years.

Sweetie, I'm not judging you. I understand. I really do. It was many years after we were married that I told my wife the truth. I'm not proud of that. We just recently celebrated our 37th anniversary. I'm very proud of that. The heart of the matter is that it took me many, many years to face the truth myself... a passing phase, it'll go away once I'm married, and on and on and on. Until one day I finally had no choice but to face the reality of who I really was. When that day arrived, I knew that I had no other choice than to tell my wife the full and complete truth. She deserved nothing less. Risky? Sure. Frightened? Absolutely! From the sound of your posts, I think your day of realization has come.

Ultimately, the decision is yours. You, and you alone know all the intimate details of the realtionship you and your wife share with one another. All of us can only share what is in our hearts and what has happened to us in our own experiences. Mine has been positive. We had a strong relationship going into this revelation and emerged even stronger afterwards. Your results may vary. The one thing that I can tell you with absolute certainty, however is this; as long as you keep this bottled up inside yourself, you will never find peace. You have my greatest hopes for a successful resolution to this situation irregardless of the path you choose to take.

[suanne]

Thank you all for coming along side of me on this issue. I AM listening. I'am starting to understand things from a different perspective. One of the things that is really bothering me is keeping my being a cd to myself for so many years. I have never really told anybody anything about whats REALLY going on inside of me until this forum. Even when I got caught years ago by the wife I did my level best to explain it away and like I wouldn't do it again. I wanted to do that but well.....here I am. So I am in between a rock and a hard place with what to do. One part of me wants to get this out to my wife, and the other says don't do it. I guess I will listen some more. Please keep talking. Sometimes I find it very hard to get this communicated to you all properly. Hope that makes sense. In person would be a lot better communication but this will have to do and thats fine. Look I know you all are not trying to tell me what to do, thank you for that. I do appreciate all your views. I am the one who knows my wife and we will be the ones to live with what ever I do. I need to really get this out and be able to talk about it. It does feel so good to be able to do that here and I hope this will help me to find the correct way to handle any communication I have with my wife about my cding.

Suanne

[Marla GG]

Hi Suanne,

I don't think anything you've said is offensive. On the contrary, the way you explained your dilemma makes it easy to see why you are hesitant to talk to your wife. I don't blame you.

You said:


She hasn't mentioned it again except when I slipped up and left something out and then it was "you up to the old habits again?" I lied. "No" Afraid to fess up. I know she knows. I want to talk about it, but I don't know if she does. It seems to me if she wanted to know more she would ask.

You know she knows.....but knows what? From your point of view it might seem obvious. You are a member of this forum, you have read hundreds of posts from other CDs, and you know all about this stuff. But I bet you dollars to donuts that your wife has no idea what a crossdresser is. All she probably knows is that whatever is going on with you and women's clothes must be something bad and shameful because you keep trying to hide it. She could be suffering in silence, thinking you are secretly gay. Maybe she thinks you have a desire to be with other women and the clothes are part of that fantasy. Who knows? My point is, she might be afraid to bring it up because she has no idea what can of worms she would be opening. After 40 years of marriage, she doesn't want to rock the boat any more than you do. But you have an advantage: you KNOW what it all means. You know that crossdressing isn't sick or perverted or a threat to your marriage. She doesn't. So in my opinion, that puts the responsibility on you to make the first move.

I won't tell you what you should do; as everyone else has said, you know your wife best and it has to be your decision. But I do want to remind you that what she "knows" may be completely wrong, and you need to decide whether you want to let her keep thinking things that could be a lot worse than the truth.

[suanne]

Thanks Marla. That makes sense to me. I hadn't thought of things from that angle. This is really helping me to sort this thing out. If I can use an
analogy here: My situation is like looking at two mountains from a distance. I see one, then two mountains. But I can't see what lies between them. You all are helping me to see what is between them. Like getting a different angle on things.

Thanks to all. Suanne

[Sarahgurl371]

Marla you make an excellent point. Thank you for helping me to see the other side of the coin. Kathy, thank you as well.

[Dragster]

You're always there with the words of wisdom Marla. I hope I find that's what has been bothering my wife when we eventually get around to talking about it (after she's read "My Husband Betty"). I've got a promise for end of January now! That's progress, if it happens! Only 9 months in progress, but best not to rush these things eh!

Tony