Bernadina
11-23-2006, 08:05 PM
This was published in a Canadian Newspaper. - Dina
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Dressing up in women's clothing is no laughing matter for some
Alan Ferguson, The Province
Published: Tuesday, November 21, 2006
For some people, dressing up is a bit of a lark. You couldn't turn on the TV last week without seeing some gaudily-costumed clown hamming it up in Winnipeg for Grey Cup week.
All quite harmless. Good for a laugh, really.
But what if it's not a game? What if your fetish for wearing other peoples' clothes is not just an unshakable habit but a compulsion ruling your life?
The predicament was brought to my attention after I wrote here recently about how New York City is accommodating the needs of its trans-gendered community.
I was taken to task for being flippant. One correspondent said it was "like laughing at a baby born with no arms."
Ouch. Fortunately, the folks at Vancouver's Cornbury Society offered to fill the gaps in my knowledge about the world of gender confusion.
The society bills itself as "a social, educational and support group for crossdressers." And its membership, while varied, consists mostly of people whose bodies tell them they are men, but whose minds insist they are women.
I was asked to imagine what it must be like to wake up in the morning as a guy with an overwhelming desire to put on a dress.
In the trans-gendered world, the compulsion is apparently irresistible, even though the fear of being "read" -- identified as a crossdresser -- is a constant anxiety.
Exactly how many people there are like this is unclear; crossdressers aren't part of that in-yer-face, minority-rights lobby on a sharp look-out for a juicy discrimination case to haul before a human rights tribunal. No, the world of the crossdresser is lonely, and often painfully sad.
"Stephanie," now a 58-year-old Vancouver grandfather, has endured a life-long battle with gender identity, aware of his/her dilemma since the age of six.
His parents hadn't a clue, and his first wife, who knew of his orientation, "wanted to cure me." When the marriage ended after 13 years, "Stephanie" went into depression, avoiding new contacts "because I didn't want this side of me destroying other relationships."
Even though he has since remarried, he's haunted by his own admission that he "probably would have transitioned" -- become a woman, that is -- except that the urge was "not strong enough to counterbalance all the family considerations I have."
He tries to argue he is "gender-gifted," but admits to feeling "dishonest" dressing as a man to hide his compulsion from colleagues at work.
"It's something you are born at . . . it's that far down in your being," he says. "(People like us) are so even-balanced (between man and woman) we're off-balance."
That's no laughing matter.
Having, as one website puts it, "a mind that is literally, physically trapped in a body of the opposite sex" is little short of a nightmare.
I can't imagine the misery of being daily tormented by the cruel contradiction between your gender and your physical sex.
alan.f@telus.net
© The Vancouver Province 2006
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Dressing up in women's clothing is no laughing matter for some
Alan Ferguson, The Province
Published: Tuesday, November 21, 2006
For some people, dressing up is a bit of a lark. You couldn't turn on the TV last week without seeing some gaudily-costumed clown hamming it up in Winnipeg for Grey Cup week.
All quite harmless. Good for a laugh, really.
But what if it's not a game? What if your fetish for wearing other peoples' clothes is not just an unshakable habit but a compulsion ruling your life?
The predicament was brought to my attention after I wrote here recently about how New York City is accommodating the needs of its trans-gendered community.
I was taken to task for being flippant. One correspondent said it was "like laughing at a baby born with no arms."
Ouch. Fortunately, the folks at Vancouver's Cornbury Society offered to fill the gaps in my knowledge about the world of gender confusion.
The society bills itself as "a social, educational and support group for crossdressers." And its membership, while varied, consists mostly of people whose bodies tell them they are men, but whose minds insist they are women.
I was asked to imagine what it must be like to wake up in the morning as a guy with an overwhelming desire to put on a dress.
In the trans-gendered world, the compulsion is apparently irresistible, even though the fear of being "read" -- identified as a crossdresser -- is a constant anxiety.
Exactly how many people there are like this is unclear; crossdressers aren't part of that in-yer-face, minority-rights lobby on a sharp look-out for a juicy discrimination case to haul before a human rights tribunal. No, the world of the crossdresser is lonely, and often painfully sad.
"Stephanie," now a 58-year-old Vancouver grandfather, has endured a life-long battle with gender identity, aware of his/her dilemma since the age of six.
His parents hadn't a clue, and his first wife, who knew of his orientation, "wanted to cure me." When the marriage ended after 13 years, "Stephanie" went into depression, avoiding new contacts "because I didn't want this side of me destroying other relationships."
Even though he has since remarried, he's haunted by his own admission that he "probably would have transitioned" -- become a woman, that is -- except that the urge was "not strong enough to counterbalance all the family considerations I have."
He tries to argue he is "gender-gifted," but admits to feeling "dishonest" dressing as a man to hide his compulsion from colleagues at work.
"It's something you are born at . . . it's that far down in your being," he says. "(People like us) are so even-balanced (between man and woman) we're off-balance."
That's no laughing matter.
Having, as one website puts it, "a mind that is literally, physically trapped in a body of the opposite sex" is little short of a nightmare.
I can't imagine the misery of being daily tormented by the cruel contradiction between your gender and your physical sex.
alan.f@telus.net
© The Vancouver Province 2006