CD or TG?

[Danielle19]

So, I have a question for those who plan on starting their transition, have started, or have transitioned.

Did any of you start out thinking you were a crossdresser then slowly realized that you were actually trans? How did you come to this realization?

[JanePeterson]

Yep!! Dressed off and on since childhood... Then this year I stayed dressed for longer than it used to take to gratify myself... After telling my SO and overcoming my shame... Before dressing used to be exciting and all about looking fem, but it quickly became apparent to me when I stayed en femme that it was not about the clothes... That the girl in the mirror was an image of an idea, that the smile on her face was one of actual happiness... This was followed by some serious anxiety going back into male mode... And is slowly forming into a resolve to start the process bit by bit, and to learn as much about what the road really looks like.

[Danielle19]

Okay, I'm just trying to see how many people went or are going through the same things I am right now. So you haven't started transition yet? Either way good luck to you :)

I'm currently in the middle of desperately wanting to transition one second and then not wanting to the next.

[stefan37]

Stop worrying about transition and just live your life as you feel comfortable.

[JanePeterson]

I'm currently in the middle of desperately wanting to transition one second and then not wanting to the next.

I feel that way too sometimes... I DO know I don't want facial hair anymore, so I'm starting electro now till I figure out how deep the rabbit hole goes

Oh, I have not started transition yet, but I think I'll be there someday soon- lots of complications to work through

[STACY B]

You have to understand yourself and what information was available and what kind of examples you had to go by all of our lives to know if certain ones thought we were CD's or Gay or something else. NOW we can say this or that after the fact,, Hell I didn't know what it was or why it was or anything at all really.

Yea you can say you started out a CD and found out you are Trans or Maybe just Maybe you were Trans the whole time but never knew what Trans was or how to deal with it or even what to do about it? Most if not all started out getting aroused from being female in our thoughts or dressing from time to time,, Then further down the line it turned to something else all together. Why, Was it more education? Later in life Hormones imbalance that drove us to it? More social acceptance? Or did we just run out of options?

Lots and Lots of people back then and still do now get all of this confused with sexual attraction, But after you get so deep you realize that it's so far away from the truth like apples and oranges and you can't explain it to most people because of it being to complex for explanation with just a short amount of time your with someone. Like my SO for instance,, It took her years and years of talking and talking to the point of getting tired of hearing it actually get it and understand it fully.

But it is pretty common to want to present female to relieve stress and get gratified in the only way you can,, And that is Dress,, But what most tell you on here is you could Never understand the real meaning of being Trans until you start HRT,, That really puts you in a female chemical state as well as the mental state you have always had and learned how to cover up and suppress from the world.

Another Big one is now you know your Trans and have the tools to deal with it with therapy and opening up to some now you have to figure out is it just Gender Dysphoria alone or did you get blessed with an additional common added little thing called Body Dysphoria to add to the Mix,,lol,, I for one got Lucky and only have the Gender Dysphoria, Not the dreaded Body one also,, So once you think you got it there are more surprises in store,,lol,,, :devil::devil::devil::devil::devil::devil:

[Danielle19]

Oh okay! Yeah I'm that way with body hair, just can't afford hair removal due until I graduate. Nice on the electrolysis though! Goodluck! :)

- - - Updated - - -

And Stacey your post made me feel so much better about this! It helped me understand myself a lil more so thanks :)

[MissDanielle]

there's some great Groupon deals out there for hair removal.

Over the past several years, I kept feeling this pull and I kept repressing it. Mental gymnastics are not fun, let me tell you. My mom hopes I'm a CD but I'm like (silently), Nope...

[whowhatwhen]

Stop worrying about transition and just live your life as you feel comfortable.

I thought it was more along the lines of agonizing analysis paralysis until you give up and face the inevitable tranny demons that keep knocking at your door.
Well, not literal demons but you know what I mean.

[Kate T]

I would suggest that most mature age transitioner's started feeling that they were either CD, gendered or gender fluid.

I personally also suspect that most female attracted MTF TS tend to be both 1. "late onset" i.e. they transition later and 2. typically identify as either CD or gender fluid initially prior to acknowledging a TS identity.
There are a few reasons I suspect why this is the case. I make a couple of assumptions though. Assumption 1. Gender, Physiology and Sexuality are intrinsic and separate but they are also key factors in identity formation of an individual. And 2. Reproductive necessity (i.e. wanting to having ones own biologic children) is an intrinsic behaviour and not learned.

Making the above two assumptions it is not hard to see how the Female gendered, Male bodied and female attracted individual due to reproductive necessity essentially suppresses or limits the female gender identity by deflecting it into crossdressing or sexual fetish behaviours. Because if this individual acknowledges a female identity and takes steps to transition then they essentially deny themselves biologic reproduction. I'm not saying that either choice is "better" than the other, just that it if the individuals need for biologic reproduction is strong then the only way they can fulfil that is via suppression or limitation of their gender identity.

The above also can be used to explain early age onset transition in Female gendered, male bodied male attracted individuals. Their sexuality has already denied them biologic reproduction with the partner of their choice thus there is little need to suppress or limit their gender identity. Gender identity thus becomes the principal influencer of their decision making and consequently the individual is more likely to take steps towards transition as soon as possible.

The above is in no way meant to supply a blanket explanation for everyones feelings or pathway. It was merely an attempt to give a reasonable and understandable explanation regarding the psychological and behavioural observations that I suspect many individuals express and experience.

[Jennifer-GWN]

Kate; hmmm interesting assertion. Put me in the late transitioner space. Now 54 and full time. In the early days for me the labeles where cd or drag queen. I was not a drag queen. I also clearly knew that I had gender congruency issues. I'd sum these up as questioning my gender and how I was developing throughout puberty while at the same time accepting, while challenged mentally, my male role and one could say duties or destiny to marry and have children as part of that union. My first marriage ended within 3 years given said desires to express my fem side. At that point I went in hiding for a number of years until again settling down and having children while suppressing those inward feelings even more strongly. We split after almost 8 years. I chose at that point to continue to support my duties in a male capacity for an additional 10 years until my son finished school. At that point there was no turning back and my transition went very quickly from there as much had been planned in advance and certain things had been set in motion in private well in advance which allowed the last 12 months to go as quickly and as smoothly as it did.

So for me early on it was all cd as that was the known construct. Transgendered and transitioning was but a fleeting notion based on 2 individuals Caroline Cossey and Melanie Phillips who represented the 2 shining examples that there might be hope in the form of a path available as a dream. I never considered myself as gay or bi at any point as my attractions have mostly always been female directed. Over the past year I've discovered I might be a bit more flexible in this area then I'd thought (with a smile).

Obviously as the Internet came of age the world of understanding broadened and more clarity emerged. Clearly I've lived a comparatively more sheltered life in my younger days then many or just a reflection of the time.

Depression, self discovery, and sole searching addressed my issues with a lot of help enabled me to come to terms with what needed to be done and who I was which led to finally transitioning. I'm definitely not a CD but a proud TG whose transitioned.

Cheers... Jennifer

[MissDanielle]

The internet has definitely helped with understanding. I just wish the visibility had been as strong when I was in middle and high school!

[Eryn]

Did any of you start out thinking you were a crossdresser then slowly realized that you were actually trans? How did you come to this realization?

Yep, that's me. Being trans was so far from my worldview that being a crossdresser was all I could grasp.

After doing that with increasing frequency over the last few years I found that I was spending less and less time in boy mode. Without really thinking about it I've become a female who crossdresses as male when I have to.

[Michelle789]

As a kid, I wanted to grow up to be a woman, but couldn't say anything to anyone without fear of getting ridiculed or having my parents worry about me.

As a kid, I wanted to wear women's clothes, but couldn't say anything to anyone without fear of getting ridiculed or having my parents worry about me.

As a teenager, I started sneaking wearing my mom's clothes, and started hating the masculinization of my body, but I had no idea why this was happening. I didn't know what a crossdresser nor a transsexual was.

At age 22, I got my own place, and my own stash of women's clothes. I learned what a CD and TS are. I knew I was definitely a CD. I suspected I was TS, but was not in a position to seriously consider transitioning. So I settled for thinking that I was a CD (or lived in denial of being TS).

At age 33, it became clear to me that it's transition or die. I realized that I am TS rather than CD.

CDing wasn't in itself my identity, but was rather than a phase of trying to understand who I really am, until I was ready to accept my female identity and transition.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

change the ages 22 and 33 to 45 and 47 ...and michelle tells my story...

rememeber that we are 5 or 6 and this crazy thought is in our heads.... our circumstance, our intelligence, our way of thinking through things all conspire to inform our gender identity..

i took it as a simple fact of life....i was a boy...I "wished" i was a girl and i plotted my future where i would magically turn into a girl...or pretend i was a girl...
others say they knew they were a girl and in my opinion its the same thing with different coping thoughts, and probably a function of the intensity of the gender identity...

i dressed alot ..and over the years i learned about cd'ing...and i understood transsexuals to be freaks and sex perverts... not me...

i literally never ever ever considered myself for one second to be possibly transsexual until my 40's and even then i felt guilt and shame over my transsexuality because i interpreted it as a selfish uber crossdresser experience..

even today, i struggle with the words "i am a woman".... i say instead, "i am a woman in my mind"....

and yet, transition saved my life and it was the best thing i ever did for myself...

[MissDanielle]

I'd say I was definitely questioning a lot in my 20s as to whether I was trans or. Keep in mind, I didn't really have much chances to CD so I didn't really do the whole CDing for years like other people before they started to know that they were TS. Like Michelle, I said nothing to anyone (and my parents think I'm mentally ill) and now my dad says I can't be trans because I didn't know when I was 4-7. It's possible that I could have known but I was very shy growing up.

[I Am Paula]

Still deciding if I'm finished transition. Full time 3 years, all my female ID, don't own a stitch of my old life.

For many years I considered myself a crossdresser. I used it to quell the dysphoria. The dysphoria grew, and grew, until I found myself living almost 24/7 as a woman. I was getting more depressed all the time, and finally, portraying a part time woman no longer helped. One day it took me 5 hours to get dressed as a guy, with bouts of crying, and self hatred. A few days later I decided that there was no amount of band-aid fixes that would help, and I must transition.
I was the luckiest girl in the world, in that everyone I spoke to knew exactly what to do. A GP sent me to the trans specialist Endo, who asked me for a one hour evaluation with a therapist, who sent my letter to the Endo, who prescribed...etc. The mechanics of it was very easy.

[Eringirl]

I guess you can put me in the "late stage" transition category. But knew, as we all did, from an early age something wasn't right. But for me it was body dysphoria, not as much about dressing. I was official diagnosed as TG 15-16 years ago. Been in therapy since then. But waited until now to really do something about it, and it will be 1.5 years from not presenting or showing outwardly any hints of being trans to going full time. So like Jennifer, and others I'm sure, once it became apparent that I had to do this, things began to move pretty fast! The benefit is that a lot planning has been done, things put in place, sorta....and when the pin was pulled on the Tranny grenade. (TM), things blew up, I walked out of the rubble, began to transition and start my new life.

The key for me is having great therapists, a support team of Drs and other practitioners, and of course, family and friends. Everyone's journey is their own, but a common thread is to it smart and do it safe.

My 2 cents worth......

[dreamer_2.0]

At age 33, it became clear to me that it's transition or die. I realized that I am TS rather than CD.

CDing wasn't in itself my identity, but was rather than a phase of trying to understand who I really am, until I was ready to accept my female identity and transition.

Michelle's entire post is quite similar to my experiences also. Sure, I began as a crossdresser but that was based on my knowledge at the time. It took me a while to understand and accept that I'm trans; I still struggle with it some days. Several years ago, before I knew anything about being trans, I recall seeing a trans woman and thinking to myself that I wished whatever was bothering me was "bad enough" to warrant a transition. I later learned that it was gender dysphoria that was bothering me, and it actually was "bad enough" and only got worse since that moment.

Around 32 or 33 is when I came to realize, like Michelle, it was either transition or die. I had/have zero interest in living a life (if you can call it that) as a man and that wasn't changing. The only thing that was changing was the depth of the hole of depression I had dug for myself. After much struggling I literally said "f*ck it" in a therapy session and decided to begin my transition. Some people say they didn't decide to transition, my experience is different because I absolutely did decide to transition. I didn't, however, decide to be trans.

[becky77]

I knew it was more than just CDing but I didn't have the knowledge to know what the problem was.
A shameful secret to not dwell on too long.

[Danielle19]

Thank you so much everyone for the replies and sharing part of your story. You all helped me understand my situation more!

[Suzanne F]

I knew when I was about 5 that I really wanted to be a girl. The mere thought if it would make my face warm. But no you didn't mention that in Kentucky in 1970. When the thought would come up that I really wasn't a boy I just pushed it down as far as I could. So I never really dressed just a few isolated events. When almost 3 years ago my wife asked me if I wanted to be a woman I was amazed when "sometimes" came out of my mouth. Yes I did the crossdresser thing for about 6 months before it was painfully evident that I was TS. Here we are now fully out , HRT for 8 months and GRS on May 12th. I am a late transitioner thank God!
Suzanne

[grace7777]

Back in late 2007 I started crossdressing. It was not until 2011 that I went out in public dressed en femme. Around mid 2014 I started to realize that I was much more than a crossdresser. Realized that I was trans. At that time I first started considering the idea of transitioning. Since then, the desire has only gotten stronger.

When I viewed myself as just a crossdresser, I thought going out dressed once or twice a month would be satisfying, but it was not. I felt the need to present as a woman more and more. It has now gotten to the point that I present as a female whenever possible. Now, I only present as male for work related activity, or if I visit family, which happens no more than twice a year.

I am now on a path that I never intended to go on. Life would be so much easier if I was not trans, if I was just the the average male, but I am what I am. Now I realize it is not healthy for me to deny who I am. At times I become very depressed when having to present as male.

Right now I am not in a great position to start HRT, but hopefully that will change soon.

Often times now I find myself thinking and picturing of how wonderful it would be if I fully transitioned which would include having GRS.

[PretzelGirl]

even today, i struggle with the words "i am a woman".... i say instead, "i am a woman in my mind"....

Kaitlyn, I am sorry. You are a woman and so much more. There is so much we can read in each other's writing and yours is so caring and very thoughtful. We can sense it.


I always say I was a little different from the typical path. I have a small memory as a kid in wanting to wear my sisters play dress. I raided the stored clothes in the basement. I never thought "I am a girl". A trip to the Army for a little bit (20 years), spread out my explorations as the barracks didn't cut it. After was when it got legs. I think I first came on here saying I was a "dresser". I quickly moved to using Transgender as I view it as an umbrella term and it gave me an out for wherever I landed. I went to a support group that had a lot of transitioning members and two of us that weren't. I always introduced myself ending with "I don't think I will transition, but I don't want to rule it out so denial won't be in my way". I think that attitude benefited me in the end or it just showed that I already knew. I was going through body changes throughout my exploration, so when my dysphoria was at the high end, it was an easy decision. And I say my dysphoria, but I don't sense it was as crippling as it was for others. I simply knew it was all wrong and I had to fix it, so I did.

[pamela7]

Before I can answer the OP, I first have to say that it's not about what other people think or feel about me, it's how me feels about me.

I have soul-searched back through my life this last year to find understanding because being late-onset in terms of realising this need, I had to be sure - ho ho.

The particular aspect I'll choose to represent this is "panties and underpants". As soon as I was old enough to choose my own, I abandoned the old y-fronts for "briefs" - the tighter the better, and I could never abide boxers. When at the age of 41 I finally met a woman i could be myself with, I started wearing panties. I did not know the words CD or underdresser tho. Finally, at 54 i suddenly had the inspiration to try more than panties, and all hell broke loose - avalanche. The signal really was the metaphor of the undergarments reflecting the inner me. The outergarmet shift means i can also be the real me on the outside too. I think this is why I so quickly decided it was not cross-dressing; these are my clothes. In parallel I have a lot of sense of my life and behaviours by seeing the girl and woman within, why would i integrate "the goddess" psycho-spiritually years before I thought about CD if not for ...? The story and analysis is a lot longer than that, I'm just lucky to have great tools to unravel it all.

[Michelle789]

and now my dad says I can't be trans because I didn't know when I was 4-7. It's possible that I could have known but I was very shy growing up.


I believe everyone of us intrinsically knew at the ages of 4 to 7, give or take. Our gender identity is inherent in is. It is how we are naturally hardwired. This is why we often have some sort of inkling at such a young age. This is why some of us may

-wish we were girls
-wish we could be turned into girls
-wish we could grow up to be women
-envy girls
-desire to wear girls clothes
-have little interest in masculine activities (we may not be good at macho/athletic behaviors, but may still think logically, and be good at intellectual things)
-have more interest in feminine activities (even if we repress those desires)





I personally also suspect that most female attracted MTF TS tend to be both 1. "late onset" i.e. they transition later and 2. typically identify as either CD or gender fluid initially prior to acknowledging a TS identity.


My belief is we repress our female identity for a multitude of reasons.

1. There was no internet until the late 1990s, and very few avenues to even learn about our transsexuality. Even if you had an internet connection in the 1990s, it was likely an incredibly slow dial-up connection that got disconnected very easy. We often don't understand why we feel the way we do, nor do we even know what a transsexual is. I didn't learn what a transsexual was until the age of 22 when I got my own apartment.

2. We are under tremendous pressure to do so by our families and by society. Our maleness is reinforced by our parents, teachers, kids in school, the media etc. As we become adults, we are pressured to "man up" to keep our jobs, to fit in socially, and to please our parents. We try to do the best we can to conform to our gender assigned at birth.

3. I don't believe in Blanchard's binary of "late onset" and "early onset", but rather there is a spectrum of when we transition. What about people who transition in their 30s. We may be in the middle of the whole "early onset" and "late onset" thing.

4. Those who have are attracted to women, and have an easier time at learning how to act like a man, are more likely to delay transition until a later age.

5. Those who are attracted to men, or have a difficult time at learning how to act like a man, are more likely to transition early.

6. I believe with the internet and as we see more acceptance of transgender people in the future, more and more of us will transition at early ages. Teens, or even before puberty.

7. It is our own personality and our environment that influence the age which we transition. Also, keep in mind there are many people who attempted transition at a young age, abandoned it, and transitioned later in life. There are lots of "late onset" TSes who attempted a transition at an early age, and if they didn't abandon it, would have been considered "early onset"







I recall seeing a trans woman and thinking to myself that I wished whatever was bothering me was "bad enough" to warrant a transition. I later learned that it was gender dysphoria that was bothering me, and it actually was "bad enough" and only got worse since that moment.

If you are wishing your problem was "bad enough" than it probably is "bad enough". It is only a matter of time before we will recognize how bad our GD really is and how it is truly a necessity for us to transition.

I also agree with you in that we do decide to transition. None of us decided to be TS. All of us had to make a decision about whether or not to transition. Really, our choices are

1. Attempt to live a lie as a man, and feel miserable, unfulfilled, or most importantly uncomfortable in our own skin

2. Suicide

3. Transition

If you are lucky enough where you have choice 1 as a choice, you may want to consider transition before it gets to a point where it's transition or die. For many of us, choice 1 is not an option. It's transition or die. You have a choice. Do you want to end your life? Or do you want to live and transition? Perhaps you are choosing from two or three really lousy choices, but they are still none the less choices.

@Kaitlyn - you are definitely a woman. Sometimes it is hard for us to see that because we

1. Lived so many years / decades of our lives as men. It is hard to let go of the male persona after living as a man for so long. We also have a mostly male history behind us. If you lived 30, 40, or 50 years as a man, when you start your transition, guess what? Your're entire life history is as a man. You have zero history as a woman. After living as a woman for a year and a half, I now have some life history as a woman. Even though I have way more life history as a man, I now have some chapters in my life as a woman. It takes time to build any history of life as a woman. There will always be chapters of my life story as a man.

Remember that the United States didn't always have 240 years as the USA. In the 1770's and 1780's, we had 150+ years of mostly colonial history. The transition from colonial America to the USA included 8 years of a bloody, ugly, awful war before we even begun living life as the USA. And there weren't even close to being 50 states back then.

2. Society tells us that there is something wrong with us. We were forced to adhere to the script of the male role. Society thinks we're either freaks or men in dresses.

3. Our bodies betray us. Because we have undergone decades of testosterone poisoning that deformed our bodies, we often still see a man staring back at us when we look at ourselves in the mirror. This can be because of our faces, or bodies below the face, or both. It can take years, if ever, to truly see a woman when we look at ourselves in the mirror.

[MissDanielle]

Thanks, Michelle. I am attracted to men but because of growing up the way I did, I repressed who I am for as long as I could. So here I am at 31 acknowledging that I'm a straight girl in the wrong body. I can say that I was self aware in the 8th grade but was teased enough as it was.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

thanks so much for some of the comments directed towards me on this thread... they made me feel good
i know in my heart you are right.

:hugs:

[Katrina26cd]

I have tried to just be a cross dresser or gender fluid Those are just a compromise to ease the pain of admitting who I really am

[JenniferZ2009]

Yep!! Dressed off and on since childhood... Then this year I stayed dressed for longer than it used to take to gratify myself... After telling my SO and overcoming my shame... Before dressing used to be exciting and all about looking fem, but it quickly became apparent to me when I stayed en femme that it was not about the clothes... That the girl in the mirror was an image of an idea, that the smile on her face was one of actual happiness... This was followed by some serious anxiety going back into male mode... And is slowly forming into a resolve to start the process bit by bit, and to learn as much about what the road really looks like.

I had pretty much the same experience. I started staying dressed longer and longer and then wamo 7 years later I have been full-time for about 5 years.

[Marcelle]

Late bloomer category myself. Oh, I always new Marcelle was not quite wired like all the other boys but in the generation I grew up in there were no stories about transitioning youth, no internet . . . it was a taboo subject and something dark, perverse and not natural.

So I socialized boy and continued with life. Even my first dalliance with dressing fully my first year in the military was confusing to the point where I beat it into submission and buried her beneath a 32 year career of macho mucho army guy. It all imploded and I found myself confused, depressed and in a very dark place at the age of 50. Don't get me wrong I knew what transgender was but I had a hard time accepting that it was more than just dressing up for me. So I found my way here and all indications was I was CD so I latched on to that like a drowning person latches on to a floatation device. That lasted about a year before I began questioning and 2 years before I pulled the pin.

Cheers

Marcelle