At birth

[Kendra Sue]

I think my pleasure of crossdressing was formed at birth. It goes away but always comes back

[Teresa]

Kendra,
In my case I'm sure you are right , I see it as some wiring connections not all in the right place . I've never had it wax and wane it's 24/7 for me .

I can't say it's always been a pleasure but more like a rollercoaster ride for me and not easy at times for the family .

[Crissy 107]

Kendra Sue, I think it may have started before birth when you were in the womb. As for the need/urge to cross dress it is very common for it to come and go but it will always come back, usually stronger then before.

[Vicky_Scot]

Totally agree. I have no doubt my crossdressing was established in the womb as was my other traits, eye colour, hair colour etc etc.

I truly believe that a hormone or chemical imbalance (god knows what it was) during gestation was the cause. Would I have chosen to be a crossdresser, probably not as it brings its own problems and restrictions on your life. Certainly not a lifestyle choice.

Do I want to be a woman full time...No

Do I want to express my feminine side more.....Yes

So that's the dilemma for me. I am very lucky to have an very accepting and understanding wife so can not really grumble.

X x x

[Andrea Renea]

Not sure about at birth but I've had this desire for as long as I can remember.

[Kendra Sue]

So you totally live as a woman. May I ask what your job is?

[BTWimRobin]

I would agree. It's something you are born with.

[Vicky_Scot]

So you totally live as a woman. May I ask what your job is?

Kendra who are you asking?

[Teresa]

Kendra,
I'm not sure who you are asking the question to but I'm now retired and separated after 44 years of marriage and at that point when I moved into my new home I went full time . I finally have a balance in my life which has taken 68 years . My avatar picture was taken at a Xmas party last December .

[Vicky_Scot]

Wow Teresa, separated after 44 years of marriage, that must have been a real life changer. Well at least now you are being who you truly want to be and your still young. x

[Teresa]

Vicky,
Young-ISH !!!

I must admit it's like a second wind , I never would have thought all this was waiting for me , I do question if 68 is too old to start again but then I wouldn't wan't to be a lonely , grumpy, old man , I can't think of anything worse !!

[Kendra Sue]

Teresa I was asking you if you worked as a woman Congrats on retirement I love being retired

[VS Fan]

I agree - some aspects of our personality certainly develop as a result of life experiences, but some of what we are is just “there”.... whether it’s genetic or spiritual who knows?

[GretchenM]

Kendra,

You are very likely correct, but actually Crissy is even closer to the truth. Most of the scientific evidence is pointing toward this behavior pattern being a genetic predisposition or just maybe some kind of genetic determination. This being another of our many predispositions is probably the case. So, you are born with this trait already established, but not yet active, just like being right or left handed. Those are predispositions that are triggered soon after you begin to reach out and grab things. You find one hand works better than the other and that is because of the predisposition and once triggered it can't easily be turned off. If you are predisposed to being right handed but that hand is defective, the predisposition is not triggered because the left hand is your only functional hand. You become left handed and that hand works just as well without the active predisposition as the right hand would have worked had it not been defective.

So, with gender variance, if that is a predisposition as many, many studies seem to show, all it takes is a trigger to activate that behavior pattern. The trigger often happens early in childhood, but sometimes doesn't get triggered until later in life. All depends on your life experiences. But as for how strongly that behavior is expressed, well, that is the devil in the details. We are all different in that regard. It is not black and white but multicolored. Thus all the variation. Still lots of questions to be answered, but those who study this are getting closer and closer to a definite answer as to "Why."

Look up some of my posts from a few months ago where I present a good deal of the evidence. It is way too complicated to repeat here.

Gretchen

[Helen_Highwater]

The post raises the question asked so many time of nature vs nurture. I'm sure there's something in us all the gives us a leaning towards the direction we've taken. I do wonder however that if my early upbringing had been somewhat different whether I'd have followed the same path.

Once we've begun our journey I think it's one we're on for life. Once triggered there's no going back. That said I'm open minded as to whether it's totally written from the womb or a combination of events and nature that ultimately sets our course.

I also think it's necessary to differentiate between those who CD and never go public and those who either go out and about, possibly going full time and then those who know that they're born in the wrong body. I suppose you could argue that even fetish dressers have that desire set from birth but I'm less convinced on that one.

Having said all that, I wouldn't dispute that those who identify as Gay are born that way. I see nothing that says to me that's a learned behavior. Perhaps our dressing is more a signal, an indicator that we're drawn to living a more feminine lifestyle. We're not in the wrong body just in one that's not quiet a good a fit as we'd like.

[Teresa]

Helen,
I'm going to stick my neck out and say most but not all are from birth even fetish dressers . In my case the T kicking in early on top of having a female trait from birth did complicate the situation , it all happened at once with a bit of a bang so the male side was overlaid with a female side that needed to show itself dressed as a girl/woman and then the whole lot was entwined with sex . Some don't like it but I feel that's when the male-lesbian stuation started along with my GD, OK and lets just throw in AGP !

All very complicated but all taken care of and in balance now , this is why I don't dwell on labels anymore , I'm Teresa to me and the World and that's really the only label I find I need .

Kendra,
I was a self employed photographer for thirty years , through that and having kids growing up the CDing side was tucked uncomfortably in the closet or as I called it solitary confinement . I hope to get my painting group off the ground and will do it as Teresa , everyone knows that plan .

[alwayshave]

Kendra Sue, I'm not sure about birth, but I can remember wanting to wear girl's/women's clothes from the age 4 on. I really don't remember much prior to then, so maybe birth.

[Kendra Sue]

Thank you for sharing. Nice to know you found your niche in life and were able to pusue it. Hope your painting career takes off

[Amy Lynn3]

For me I feel the urge to wear female clothing began in the womb. In my mind that statement brings on another question, that I have answered. Do I enjoy being a crossdresser ? My answer is yes. Parts of it I do not like, such as keeping it secret for the major portion of my life. However, the joy it has given me far out weighs the negative.:2c:

[JaclynL61]

For me the desire has been there as long as I remember. I can only assume it was there at birth.

[Scheryl_O]

My therapist asked if I knew if my mom took a drug for morning sickness when she was pregnant with me. I certainly did not know if she did or not. She told me about a study of woman who were pregnant in the early to mid sixties that were given a drug for morning sickness whose sons were cross dressers or transgender. That there was a strong correlation that the two were connected. The later part of the sixties the drug was removed from the market after reformulations were found to cause many more side effects. If this is not the case, I believe like most of use that it starts as a mis wiring in our brains in the as we developed in the womb. My mom did tell me years ago she was positive I was going to be a girl. The pregnancies of me and my sister were the same. Either way my parents were happy with either sex as I have a sister and a brother.

[Tracii G]

Not sure how long its been there but I think there is a hormone factor involved.
Thalidomide was the drug that was used for nausea in pregnant women in the 50s and early 60s.
It did cause birth defects in limbs not forming fully in the womb.
Not sure if my Mom ever took it because none in the family was affected.
I believe it is still used for some cancers.

[NancySue]

I think it’s genetic and psychological. As with other things, it’s within us, but needs a stimulus to trigger itself. In my early years. I can so distinctly remember not being interested in women’s clothes, until that day when I put on my first pair of pantyhose. I experienced feelings I’d never felt before. I was immediately “hooked”. For me, the ebbs and flows, the pink fog, etc. are triggered psychologically by the pleasure principle, explaining, for me, why the feelings and needs to dress always return. Just my theory.

[vivian fair]

I, for one, firmly believe that this condition is an inherited trait. As I am now sure of occurrence on both sides of my family. Two, possibly 3 uncles on moms side. Grandfather, dad and myself on male side. My first introduction to fem wear,(that I know about),was at age 5 when my mother FORCED me to wear a pair of my older sisters polished cotton panties. I was at first mortified by this and hid out most of the day. Later the need to use the restroom caused me to view the cursed pink material. But for some reason I became quite excited when seeing it, and for some reason became sexually aware! We as a family moved shortly after that and as I explored my new surroundings I found a pair of pink rayon panties in the garage. I slipped them into my pocket and later put them on. To big for me, but felt great! Got caught wearing them, as I was sure mom wouldn't mind. Learned that I needed to keep any future wearing secret!! I was very good at this as no one ,that I didn't want to know ever found out. I did gain knowledge of several other young males in my town and paled with several of them. more later.

[Sometimes Steffi]

The theory I've read about proposes that the genitals and the brain develop at different times during pregnancy. All fetuses start out as female. During the fist trimester, the genitals develop based on the chromosomes. The brain develops in the second trimester. In MtF transgender people, there is a hormone imbalance where there is too much estrogen, thereby feminizing the brain. That leads to male genitals, brain feminized to some degree.

[Aunt Kelly]

An armchair appraisal of the responses here leads to some interesting, if unscientific conclusions. Some of us felt different from the time we learned their was a difference. Others, not until puberty or much later. Of course, this gets us no closer to understanding the genesis of our tendencies, but it does seem to suggest that they are different. Maybe some researcher will take up that line of inquiry.

[Alice Torn]

I always felt so different than other boys, even in kindergarten, and was picked on and bullied all through schools/

[Jane G]

Well for sure you are born who you are. But society can effect who we are to a huge extent too. The problems occur, when who we are, and who we think we should be, based on our society piers, differs.

[Angie G]

It's always here for me and I'm glad it does.:hugs:
Angie

[sometimes_miss]

Some are born crossdressers, some achieve crossdressing, and others have crossdressing thrust upon them. The biggest problem with the 'born this way' hypothesis, is that we all want it to be the answer, so we simply declare that it is.
After all, if we are all born this way, none of us, or anyone else, is responsible for our often intense desire to behave and dress as females, and our electing to indulge in doing so. We can just claim it's not our fault.
Because we are men. We are always strong. We can always resist the desire to embrace anything feminine, because we have been brought up to believe that being feminine is the worst thing we can ever be.
And that's a whole lot of responsibility to dump on a boy....and then a man.
So we just avoid it by 'oh, I was born this way', and explain away the very late onset by declaring that it was just a dormant gene.
Right.
I'm not buying it, because I can't be the only crossdresser on earth who's figured out how it happened to myself. There are probably approximately, oh, about 80 million of us on this planet. And you're telling me they were all born this way.
Nope. Not buying it.

[Stephanie47]

I gave up trying to figure it all out. The only hypothesis I heard that makes some sense to me was told to me by a psychologist/counselor who I see for war related PTSD. She is of the opinion each person, male or female, has some dna of the opposite sex within them. It is stronger in some than others. It does make some sense. Wouldn't it cover those who are born male or female but born into the wrong physical body? Or gradation of cross dressing? For some to be able to suppress the urge to emulate a woman, and, others to succumb to the urge?

I did not want to be a woman. I never have. When I was in kindergarten my teacher complimented my cowboy shirt, but, called it a blouse. I adamantly proclaimed it "is a shirt." I did not have a sister, female cousins, or female playmates. There was one girl my age who I thought was an annoyance. I got into a lot of trouble as a little kid. This cross dressing "thing" did not start until puberty. Why would a guy ever want to wear his mother's clothing and risk all the negativity associated with it? Going against societal norms and expectations never made sense. But, there I was wearing my mother's bra, girdle, panty and stockings with lipstick smeared on my face. Go figure.

There is also the possibility there may be an imprint of a past life experience. I never put any serious thought into it until my wife brought up the subject while watching a television series about little kids remember and describing past lives. She thinks it may be possible if not probable. From what I have read the vast majority of little kids forget or out grown these memories.

My counselor for war related PTSD issues is amazed at the detail and clarity I remember about my Viet Nam combat mental triggers. She says it is exceptional and way out of the norm. Some may say the repetition ingrains it in the mind. Anyway, when I was a little kid we moved from my paternal grandmother's big Victorian home to an apartment. I started to have visions of myself as a woman who had been strangled to death in a muddy parking lot. The woman was wearing not dress but had on a white slip. That image has been stuck in my mind since then. The first article of female clothing that drew my attention was my mother's white full slips which she hanged to dry in the apartment hallway. Every time she hanged them to dry I would fondle them because I loved the feel of the nylon. Ultimately I got the nerve to go further and further.

I don't think this past lives issue is so far fetched as it seems. When my wife and I are watching "America's Got Talent" many times there is a very young girl with a little kids goofy voice who breaks out into a voice totally out of character and many years older than her age. It's like they are almost in a trance or in a world unto themselves.

Try to figure out why we do what we do or why a person proclaims to be other than the birth sex. It's incomprehensible. In the 13th century I probably would have been burned at the stake as a witch!

[Teresa]

Lexi,
I assume you're commenting on CDers without dysphoria .

Being born with the trait isn't an excuse to crossdress to me it's far more , the outer shell or appearance is a window to how I feel inside . We are men in varying degrees , like many I've lived most of my life trying to prove to myself and others something that's not true , I'm now being honest with myself and others .

Whether you buy it or not my life is now balanced , I'm much happier and comfortable in my own skin which is something I didn't totally feel when I was expected to be a man .

I don't object to you making these statements but please be more precise who they are referring to , OK this is the open CDing section but there is a wide cross section of members who use it .

[CynthiaD]

I don't know about genetics or the causes of being transgender, but I know that I've always been female despite having male body parts. What amuses me is people who ask "when did you realize you were different?" Half the world is female. I'm not different. I'm a plain ordinary woman. I wish more people understood that.