SO's turn of Acceptance

Well things finally come to a head. In December 2014 I came out to my wife about my CD-ing. At first it came as a bit surprise to her as is does to most spouses. At first she was a bit reserved on her feelings and was a bit hesitant on her acceptance. Well throughout 2015 she became more and more supportive. She warmed up to the concept of me dressing, buying clothes, and wearing them. She still had a hard time with the make up though. But as the year went on I could tell she was more and more acceptance of it all. She even bought me clothes, she bought me make up… oh wait I thought she had a hard time with that. Yes I’ll get to that. She bought me shoes, clothes, we went shopping for girly things together, we’d go and get pedicures together, and various of other things. Now the things we did do were nothing over the top. If I saw a shirt that I liked she would let me or she’d bough it for me as well as other clothes. If she went shopping she’d ask me several times if I wanted anything and my response was usually no. But when she persisted I’d say sure, I’m a size 8 in shorts or jeans. And all in behold she’d come back with a pair of shorts or jeans. She would even ask me to go and try on the shorts or jeans because she wanted to see. Usually her comments were they look good. And same with the make up, during this last Christmas, she asked if I wanted anything. I said if you find one of those make up cases that has all of the eye shadow I’d like one. And of course she bought me one. Sometimes one of the things we’d do together was go shopping on a Friday or Saturday night. It was almost like our date night. We’d go out and go shopping for not only guy things but girly things too. It was one of those things we did. She often would say were not shopping for me we’re shopping for you as we’re going through the women’s shirts. She would buy me a shirt or something if she knew I liked it.

Well this last Friday she and I had a talk about several things we’ve got going on in our lives. Somehow or another she kept throwing at me words of “you and your dressing”. Finally I said some time we need to talk about that and not right now because previous conversations did not set the tone or mood. After a few more comments I said fine we’ll talk about it now. Now mind you neither one of us were mad, we just had some other family things to talk about and discuss. But as I asked her about the clothes and things she came out and said I just can’t handle it. The thought of you dressing has put me over I can’t do it. I asked why all of a sudden the change. She said there were several things, 1) she looked over my shoulder the other day and saw me on Pinterest. She said she saw a picture of a man with make-up on and it freaked her out. 2) she came back from a business trip the other day and when she walked into the closet saw a pair of sandals and running shoes on my storage bin (all of which have some clothes neatly folded and hidden behind my guy clothes in the closet). She said she saw the shoes first thing when she walked into the closet and it freaked her out once again. She said those were the two things that put her over. The thought of you wearing a bra or make up disgusts me. But yet she said I’m ok with you wearing some of the underwear (yes I’m scratching my head too). She said I just can’t do it and all I want to do is take it all and throw it in the trash. By this time I’m not sure if I was more mad, more confused, more hurt, or a combination of all the above. So I said fine I’ll take care of it all.

Now I’m at a point to where I have to go and put it all away, more so out of sight out of mind. I can fit most of my things in the storage bin no problem. But I think the thing that really gets me is that where is all of this coming from? She’s been so supportive over this last year, bought me things, and we’ve done things together. Part of me wants to be mad, part of me wants to just dress up and say screw it (but I’m not), and another part of me is just confused and don’t know what direction to turn. Just like most of us her we all have the urge to dress, it’s not something we can just stop especially since we’ve done it from childhood. It’s a part of us. Anyway, I’m just rambling on. Thanks for listening. Nikki

Acceptance seems to run hot and cold sometimes

Hi Nikki,

I'm sorry things have done a 180 there. I hope maybe that she was having a bad day. I can think of an similar incident that happened with my wife... and in the end it wasn't so much about me being dressed, but a combo of things of many things marital, the big one at the time was she wasn't feeling well and was having a bad day.

My two cents is for you to talk with her and let her know you're willing to put her first; and put Nikki away for a spell. Honesty and compromise is the key... don't purge, but remove the bins and move them to a place where they're not visible to her as a reminder.

Danielle Lee

Sorry to hear that Nikki... :hugs:

From what others have said here you're not alone in having wives and SOs with varying or reversing tolerance - I hope you can come to a workable compromise but it sounds like keeping your head down short term is the right approach for now.

Perhaps some folk just take time to work things out - keep talking; but let her lead the questions, and just be a CD Ninja for a while... (heads for the shadows...)

Good luck - and have a ramble whenever you need to... :)

Katey x

Sometimes life seems to be going very well and then there's a bump in the road. I read your post of 12-18-2015 in which you stated your wife has not seen you dressed. Even with her buying you feminine things I think she is still pondering the entire cross dressing aspect of your lives. That includes her. Without seeing you en femme, what point of reference does she have? I'm sure she envisions your manly self wearing makeup. Seeing reminders laying around the closet only will cause her to think about something she obviously finds difficult to accept. I read a post where you state you have a daughter over 21 and three boys. I am assuming you've been together/married for some time. And, I think the longevity of the marriage allowed her to weigh your positive qualities vs the cross dressing. It sounds as if she gave acceptance a whirl and has come to the conclusion she is not on board with it.

I don't think a 180 turnaround is that unusual. Your wife gave it a try and it's a no-go for her. Maybe it will swing back, maybe not. I'm sure you and most of us would love to have a progression of acceptance, but, sometimes it just does not work out. She seems rational. You may want to try to sit down and discuss her change of attitude and ask her to level with you. Explain the longevity of your cross dressing. It sounds as if you're headed to a DADT and going it alone for awhile.

Nikki, I can appreciate your confusion. Clearly, the issue was communication. You thought things were cool and yet she was feeling uncomfortable and not telling you. Then things reach a boiling point. You need to talk more frequently about how cross dressing fits in the relationship and not about clothes or makeup.

Backing off right now is the right move and your next one should be making time to have deeper conversations about her fears and concerns as well as yours with respect to the act of cross dressing. Ask her if you two can have a sit down tonight or tomorrow and spend an hour talking about what bothers her, what confuses you, why she "helped" if it bothered her, etc. She may think you are on a path that you are not on but only conversation will help.

Best of luck

My ex went from confused, and not liking it at all, to buying me some things and taking pictures of me dressed as a girl. I happily thought it was her coming around, little did I know she was just accumulating solid evidence of me as a crossdresser, to blackmail me with. But for a few months, at least I had some hope. That experience just makes it even more difficult to trust anyone.

It's really one of the worst feelings in the world to begin making peace with yourself and with the one you love knowing the whole you ... to finally start feeling solid(ish) ground beneath your feet, only to have all of that called into question at the drop of a dime. Sigh .... I know what you're going through so well.

It's happened to me a few times, and I'm sure it'll happen again. When it does, I just try to remind myself that I had like 37 years to work out how I felt about this secret side of me, and to internalize coping mechanisms ... because to the uninitiated (at least of our generation) it's the freakiest damn thing imaginable.

From that perspective, it's not hard to understand how she can flip-flop so easily on it. How many times did I go through that cycle of purging and self hate, only to emerge on the other side a few months later helpless against the girly tide that had once again welled up inside me?

It took a long freakin' time to make peace just within myself! She can't directly understand the frankly inexplicable and relentless need to express this thing which from her perspective shouldn't be there, and when you don't understand, it's so easy to tell someone else "well just don't be like that then!".

She's only had a year or so, to your lifetime. It's understandable. But it feels like having your heart ripped out.

Hang in there Nikki ... I hope things will improve soon!

I have experienced similar things with my wife, where she supports and accepts (and buys me clothes!) but then will have a really difficult time talking or engaging around my dressing. She has never seen me dressed and doesn't have any desire to, but she definitely wants to help me figure out where on the trans/dressing spectrum I fall. One day we'll have a great conversation about it and the next she'll be really cold and blame the dressing for lots of other problems (usually unrelated) that arise.

I think you just have to ride it out and continue to communicate. Figure out what the triggers are for her and how you can help avoid or alleviate them. When my wife and I were able to talk about what were the things she was really having difficulty with, I was able to accommodate her and avoid those things (stuff like leaving panties out or having the closet where my girl stuff hangs messy). We've also worked with a couples counselor who I think has been great about helping us negotiate and find common ground around these issues. It's helped me realize that her expressing anger or a moment of non-acceptance isn't always about me, and could be linked to other stuff in our lives.

It's hard, and the emotional roller-coaster can be really tough. But if you're in this for the long haul, it'll start to even out eventually and hopefully you two can find a smoother path. Good luck, girl!

Nikki,
Many of us live with the one step forward and two back it is confusing and mentally wearing. It's so easy to think you're the one that's caused the problem but wives do juggle so many things in their lives and need the man they man they married to rely on sometimes. Seeing the evidence of your CDing undermines the thought that she can rely you and all your thinking about is your dressing.
When I read of other members going out shopping with their wives and sharing other aspects of their Cding I felt deprived , now I'm not so sure. I've done it by myself from the start and accept my wife doesn't want to know, she knows where my female stash is but it stays there out of sight, no washing is left out in view.
Maybe you need to adopt that approach and stop involving her, if she begins to feel excluded then let her come in on her terms, if she chooses to become less involved tell that's fine, she's not stopping you.
Most of us have been CDers all our lives it's not going away, I'd love to totally share my CDing with my wife but it's not going to happen, she also knows it's not going away and she has good days and bad days with it, she knows sometimes that her attitude hurts me but then Cing has hurt her. We came close to separating but our children and grandchildren were enough to keep us together.

Stories like this are sad. Why is it what we love to do, which hurts nobody, is seen as this crime of the century?

Don't cheat. Don't gamble. Don't do drugs. Don't drink. Don't commit crime. Don't dis people. Yet here we are suffering as though we had done these things.

Nikki - Take care of it all but keep your stuff. It's yours, and it's good.

Wish you the best.

It's hard to understand the U-turn but it does and will happen. You're wife went on a business trip and no doubt had great chat with the other gals about your sex lives and so on and the last thing she was going to tell them was that you cross dress. Not even suggesting she had a 'fling' with a guy but it may have happened. You just have to lie low and bring it back into conversatino. She knows it's there but will ignore it until you point it up. That's women - thankful I'm not a real one.

Stephie Mont

Wow Nikki, I'm sorry to hear of the acceptance U-Turn! I'm not there (yet 😕 ) but I can certainly empathize and I'm listening when you need to vent!

If it happened to me I'd take Daniel Lee's and of course Katey's advice and go dark, for a while at least.

Although I don't know how exactly but try reintroducing the concept wrapped in some humour cuz it's tough to feel anger or discust when your laughing (or even smiling), some phsyco-biological thing ☺