Busted, Rejected........Screwed

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Originally Posted by ReineD

Just saying. It might not be a bad strategy to work on all the other marital issues first and get the marriage in good shape before tackling the additional issues surrounding the CDing.

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I can speak to this from first hand experience. As I have mentioned before, even though my first wife initially accepted and encouraged my CDing, other problems festered and a ten year long marriage collapsed. The CDing didn't cause the break up - poor communications, issues of trust, an inability to discuss problems calmly, and low self esteem (I'm talking about both parties) are all things that were problems. The CDing only became an issue when the marriage was falling apart.

To the original poster I hope that things are able to work out with your wife, for both of your sakes. I also want to apologize for the at times meanspirited comments(IMHO) that have been made. I guess I was taught to focus on the positive and be an encourager. I do believe that overall this forum is meant to be supportive and does a fairly good job of that. For some reason this posting has just taken on a judgemental and at times angry tone. Or Maybe its my imagination.

WOW what a pickle! I have postponed "telling" for 24 years, 35% sure she knows but not to the extent of the rabbit hole. Yours, sounds vindictive, the dreaded spurned female, I am so sorry for you. I know it could happen to me at any time.. stay strong, could be something more positive.

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Quote by: JulieC

You need to look in the mirror as the first step towards reconciliation. This woman's life is in tatters because of your years over years over years pattern of lying. She is shaken to the very foundations of the understanding of what her world is supposed to be.

This isn't some little deal, some harmless little secret that wasn't hurting anyone else. This was fundamental, base core foundation of your relationship.

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:yt:

why is this all about you and why are you still not purging atm? trust me if you continue to put yourself before your wife after she BUSTED you then you really aren't looking for advice or empathy but permission from others here to keep on making it go your way.

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Quote by: ikthys

I ask the reverse question- does 12 years of being a faithful wife and mother to your kids mean so little that you will let it end so that you can go on wearing nylons?

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yeah, how about that? does this also not matter one iota to you? or are you one of the selfish type who believe your marriage is an inconvenience to your dressing which YOU chose to hide from her all these years. :facepalm:

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Quoted by: Lorileah

While I agree that there should be some interests that are not shared, say fly fishing or movies or using a metal detector on the beach, if it will in any way affect your relationship it should be revealed. And being a CD will affect your relationship. And you KNOW this before you get married, you know what she thinks of most things in life, yet you remain silent...fear of never finding someone?? Fear that no one will ever love you for who you are??? Willing to hide for your sake, not theirs. I hear so often here that people hide this to protect the marriage, the children, the job. No you are protecting what YOU want to protect. You are not considering your spouse. If she does not like cross dressers and you know it you hurt her chance at happiness because she will find out. And it is easier to get on with life if you don't have all the "things" you gather as you live together.

Ok I know I am yelling into the wind here. I know that 90% of the members here are just like Clark Kent. You don't have to announce it from the mountain top but you have to tell the ones who rely on the image you are projecting. The have a vested interest in this life.

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thanks Lorileah for voicing what a lot of GGs try to get their CDing/TG partners to understand. investing so much into their relationships and marriages is also a huge part of their lives completely wasted all of a sudden on being lied to about what they love to begin with.

i'm sorry, Samantha, but after 4 years of reading at this website it seems you must have learned something in this time about coming clean with your wife, yet you purposely chose to continue hiding it, thinking you were getting away with it, not out of concern for her feelings.

there are two possible outcomes here and i don't feel sorry for you in either one:

1. your marriage is over and it's only a matter of time before the divorce comes.

2. your marriage will survive this for quite some time while your wife attempts to accept it and may even have a chance at happiness again if you can learn to compromise your needs with hers enough so that you can keep Samantha in your life.

the first outcome is most likely based on the amount of time you have been hiding this from her like a dirty secret - really, you've already done the damage there. and the other CDs here are being honest - if she has loved you all her life as her very masculine partner she will never appreciate a whole part of you "changing" to feminine in her eyes. just as you would not accept her becoming a masculine identity and behaving like a male, this is disgusting to her. as for outing you, typical of you to think of yourself in this crisis, not how much you have hurt her by this omission of an integral part of your entire persona.

you need a smack upside the head for trying the "it's just the clothes" line on lying about this for 12 years! if it wasn't that big of a deal then your fears would not have taken precedence over your natal male logic ;) lol.

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Originally Posted by ReineD

I'd like to say the same thing.

Welcome to the forum, Shiny. :) What I'm about to say may seem harsh, but as an outsider, it is objective. I do want to tell you that I have been fully supportive of my SO in and out of the bedroom since the beginning and we go out everywhere together when she's herself. But, she was honest with me from the very start, so I went into the relationship with my eyes wide open.

From your story, I gather that your ex was OK with the concept of alternative lifestyles and also CDing as long as it wasn't in her backyard, but she didn't take it well when you told her about yourself some years into the marriage. I want to point out this is natural for most people, no matter the issue. It's easier to adopt a laissez-faire attitude when issues don't impact us directly. It's also difficult to deal with broken trust when the truth comes out after some years.

You chose to use the time immediately after she found out, when she was coming to terms with being married to a CDer, to sneak behind her back and wear her clothes. She eventually came around and tried to be supportive, yet you insisted on resorting to subterfuge and sneaking panties into your shopping cart for example. I'm not putting you down for wanting the panties, but this is a passive way of dealing with it and it would have been best for the two of you to deal with it differently. Your actions eroded her trust further. And last, you say she threatened and blackmailed you during arguments. Did she ever follow through, since you are prepared to deny who you are to anyone she *may* tell and try to make her out to be crazy? And did you ever say things in anger to her as well? Just wondering.

I don't want to take away from your pain and your frustration. The situation wasn't easy for you either. But, there are always two sides to every story.

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Well, in my defense, I had CDed prior to meeting her and we had been together for two years and I hadn't dressed at all during that time. It wasn't until 1. I told her, 2. she flipped out, and 3. the relationship suffered for several months (without any sex might I add) that I started dressing again to fill that "void" inside of me. Not immediately... Bear in mind also, that I told her specifically that I USED to, but that I didn't anymore. I made it very clear that it wasn't something that I was doing behind her back. And she wasn't married to a CDer... maybe a former CDer, but I wasn't at the time and hadn't been for over two years.

Also, and I should have included this in my initial post..., when we were having this in depth talk the night I told her, she revealed quite a bit to me. Many things that I could've claimed the same level of dishonesty from her and responded with the same level of disgust. But I was hoping to expel the skeletons in our closets and cathartically work our way through our "demons" by being honest and communicating. And as for eroding her trust, she never had any idea that I was dressing again until I finally sat her down after almost a year of avoiding the subject and had a long talk with her. It was only after I basically kissed her ass for a solid 3-4 hours non-stop, that she finally gave an inch.

As far as blackmailing me during arguments, she did try to tell some friends once, but that blew over as I dismissed it. As far as if I said anything in anger to her... Anyone who's married or been married knows that things are going to be said in anger at some point.

Bottom line - I feel for the OP as my situation was similar.

This part from his original post especially hit home for me....

"I was devoted as husband and father. Dressing never got in the way of other more important things. It’s funny how a decade and a half of fulfilling my responsibilities at work, home, in the community mean absolutely ZERO in light of my desire to wear women’s clothes from time to time."

It was never a problem until she found out. She never had any complaints about the type of person that he was until she found out that he liked to wear femme clothes on occasion. Same thing with me. My ex saw me swim through a school of Mako sharks... she saw me jump in front of a pit bull to save her tiny dog... she saw me jump from airplanes... etc. I was all man in her eyes until I told her that I USED to CD. Then, I slowly became the point of blame for anything wrong with our relationship.

It reminds me of this shallow girl I went out with a few months ago. We ordered wine and the server asked if we would like to see the wine list. I worked in the service industry and I know that many servers know best as far as what wines/dishes they have to offer and I told her to choose her favorite and bring us that. So she brings it over two glasses of red and we drink away. Well, my date was into her third glass and I was into my 4th (as she was deep as a birdbath and nothing more than a great body) when the server came back by with the bottle to top off our glasses as she only had a little left and it wasn't enough for a full glass. I asked what it was and she told me (I can't remember the name now) and then the server stated that it was actually a local winery that they had just brought in and it happened to be the cheapest on the menu too, but it was the favorite of herself and the staff. My date, bitch that she was, immediately got a disgusted look on her face, and pushed the glass aside. Point being, she was fine with everything until she found out it wasn't brand name/very expensive. To me, it's the same situation. Here I was handling all of my responsibilities at work and at home and being the manliest SOB she'd ever seen, and the lone statement that I USED to CD was enough to have her change her entire perspective of me. Don't believe me? Ask Rick Astley... Everyone loved his song until they found out he was a lanky white dude with red hair. Well, she loved me until she found out I had worn panties.

hmm... from reading that last post, I'm suspecting that your ex was the one type of woman that would never accept CDing. I may be wrong, but I believe a high maintenance woman, the type who gets hair extensions and breast implants, who spends a lot of time shopping for clothes and getting manicures, whose goal in life is to look like a Victoria's Secret model, is going to be the type of woman with the hardest time accepting crossdressing in a man, even if she is very liberal in her other opinions. For a woman like that, being femme is a competition against other women and she is winning. Saying that you CD is turning yourself from the prize into the competition.

It's ironic, since I assume the more femme the woman, the more a typical crossdresser would be attracted to her, but I might be wrong about that.

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Originally Posted by SHINY-J

Here I was handling all of my responsibilities at work and at home and being the manliest SOB she'd ever seen, and the lone statement that I USED to CD was enough to have her change her entire perspective of me. Don't believe me? Ask Rick Astley... Everyone loved his song until they found out he was a lanky white dude with red hair. Well, she loved me until she found out I had worn panties.

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I hear you.

Anxiety about the CDing runs deep in our society, especially when it hits close to home. Have a look at this thread:

http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/...imple-Question...

You and other CDers have lived with the feelings inside yourselves for years, some of you for most of your lives, and you know first hand that you are OK, even though for some of you it was a struggle to gain self-acceptance and further, for some of you it took years. Other people need to overcome the same barriers in order to understand or even accept and even more so, since they have no first-hand knowledge of what it's like to be trans. And all these barriers are difficult to overcome because most things trans are still so deep in societal closets.

And if there are other issues in the marriage, if the couples don't have well-developed relationship skills, sadly the barriers are even more difficult to overcome.

I am going through the exact same thing but my history is a little different. She was supportive at first, but that waned. About 10 years ago, I told her I wanted to wear panties 24/7. From that conversation we formed a dont ask, dont tell policy. We continued on, I know she knew what I did but never said anything until she found 2 pair of panties in my drawer. Ha! Most wives probably would have thought they were souvenirs...........she knew they were mine. Well, we were going to talk about it and never did and I threw away the offending items. We have other issues in our relationship and after one particularly bad fight I retreated to my room and poured my heart heart out in a letter to her, pretty much saying the same thing you did. I should mention here that my wife has a special affection to gay men, she says she always roots for the underdog. We basicly developed another dont ask, dont tell policy. SHe told me to be honest with myself, she didnt want to be a hypocrite. After over 20 years of wearing things when I can, I am beginning to understand who I am, and where I fit into the world. And really, I just want to be me, I am fine living within the stated boundries, for now. I dont want to be selfish but I want to talk about this with her and that is out of bounds. So I guess I pour my heart out here........

I'm sorry to read about your situation. very similar to that of mine and my first wife's.

We did go to councilling for a couple of sessions, but that stopped, when the councillor said that the problem was hers and not mine, needless to say that soon stopped!

I hope you can come out the other end intact.

Marcia

geez, if you're transsexual you don't deserve to be in a heterosexual marriage, fooling a partner. i will say this time and again. you do not deserve to be in this situation UNLESS your partner knows. i dun care what your excuses are. they are never enough for putting your partner in what looks like a "gay" situation to them. if you're a cross dresser, not transsexual, this can still be worked on within a marriage but get your heads out of the pink clouds and try to accept that straight women who do not go specifically for CDs and transgirls are NOT lesbians and don't appreciate you making their relationship into something that resembles it.

don't foist this down a straight woman's throat as something she needs to accept. if you are stupid enough to hide it from her for years you do not deserve acceptance, really. if you get it you are lucky and should damn well treat it that way. if you are unlucky and your wife doesn't accept after hiding it from her for all the years you've been together, go suck on a lemon. really.

if your wife was hiding the EXACT same thing that would make most natal males angry and sick about having what looks like a gay relationship to them. natal males, get out of the pink fog and try to imagine your wife in a blue one. would you then be sitting here whinging and whining poor me or would you flat out dump her manly self and move on to a more femme thing? oh yes you would because that's how you guys operate. really, you expect far too much from natal women when you are expecting acceptance in the same situation.

that's all you CDs and transgirls need to get and you'll find the right one. honest. it's that simple. look for a partner who ENJOYS this kind of thing and stop wasting straight women's lives on your problem. you are ruining their lives by wasting their time on someone as screwed up about gender and sex as you are when they'd rather be with someone more masculine and "together" in his head as a man. and dun tell me you've got it together if you have gender issues because you really don't when you are putting others in situations like this - it's a clear indication that you have a problem, not that you have it together. i know some women here would disagree because they are into this sort of thing, but there are plenty who are not and this is the cold hard truth you "gurls" dun want to hear.

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Originally Posted by Areyan

that's all you CDs and transgirls need to get and you'll find the right one. honest. it's that simple. look for a partner who ENJOYS this kind of thing and stop wasting straight women's lives on your problem.

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I think it might be a bit more complicated than that.

Areyan, you don't pull any punches, do you? :)

I hear what you're saying too, but there are GGs who aren't into and have never been into natal women (like me), who not only are OK with this, but who support their partners' right or wishes, or whatever, to be whoever they are. In the beginning I took the notion of gender out of the equation entirely. Now it's back in and everything's good, but it is doable.

People can be flexible if everything else in the relationship is going right. :) It's not one rule fits all.

This is the best thread ever. Samantha, you just told much of my own story, my wife found me out when she discovered panties in my underwear drawer. I too went through a several year period before marriage, and 6-8 year period after marriage when I did not crossdress, but as I hit 40 it hit me like a wave. I am who I am, I've felt these urges and my feminine side first came out when I was 5-6 years old. I have contemplated therapy for me, and hopefully for the two of us. I haven't done it yet, because I know it is going to be a difficult process. Best wishes to you, we are both strong enough to talk about this aspect of our lives, we will get through it, I promise you -

KM

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Originally Posted by ReineD

I hear you.


And if there are other issues in the marriage, if the couples don't have well-developed relationship skills, sadly the barriers are even more difficult to overcome.

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I think that's what the most frustrating thing was. Our relationship was fantastic and we were BOTH very much in love. I was very accepting of not only the things I knew already knew about her past, but also the things she revealed to me that she had not brought up because she was ashamed or embarrassed. She specifically said she wanted to have that in depth conversation to open up and really get even closer in touch with each other than we already were. I didn't really have anything to tell her about other than the CDing that I HAD done (not at the time and not for 2 years). And, I repeat, I did not start CDing again until after the discussion and our sex life was essentially at a stand-still for months. Couple that with the fact that she accepted so many of her friends with their lifestyle choices and supported their choices AND that the things she told me were not exactly minor omissions... She told me that she had once gotten pregnant about 2 years before we met and had an abortion. She told me that her ex had cheated on her and she had gotten Gonorrhea. She told me that her and her ex had a threesome at one time. These aren't things that I held or would ever hold against her, but maybe they should have been mentioned somewhere within the first 2 years of marriage?

Plus, it's not like I was pining away to CD. Truthfully, I only Cd'd before I met her to enhance masturbation. It was an aide to help counter the fact that I did not have a woman to be with. It went something like this ; 1. Dress 2. Masturbate 3. Undress. As far as questioning my gender, that was never a problem. I may be in the minority here, but It's strictly a sexual fetish with me.

Did I still have thoughts of it when I was with her? Sure. Every time she wore something satin, vinyl, leather, heels, etc. It added to my excitement. Still, I don't think that my Cding years prior really warranted her reaction. The only thing that had remained for me since that time my my particular fetish for her to wear those types of clothes.

Still, I wonder what her reaction would have been if I had other things to tell her about my past. It's pointless now as the marriage is over. It's still the same situation for me now though. I still don't have a gender confusion issue. I still don't question my sexuality. I still use the femme clothes to enhance my "private" time and that's about it.

Even if I found a woman and she liked that sort of thing, I still don't think it's something that I would feel comfortable doing with her day in and day out. I would want to dress occasionally during sex and then be done with it. Just like anything else, I think it's different for everyone. For some it's only sexual and for others, it's anything but sexual and all points in between. For some, it's something they want to do on a rare occasion, and for others, they want to CD 24/7 and all points in between.

Still, no matter where one fits in the spectrums I mentioned, the majority of society does not approve or would mock them. I guess I would just think that for someone like her to have embraced her friends with all of their life choices/lifestyles and with the things I knew about her past paired with the a few extra "secrets" she had revealed to me that night, that my lone admission of one past transgression should not have caused the implosion of my marriage

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Originally Posted by Lorileah

... I think honestly that snooping in someone's history in the browser is very low and really an indication of the morality of the snooper as much as the snoopie. There was a trust problem long before the computer was left on

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I know this is a slightly older thread I was reading through, but...I've noticed in both firefox and IE that websites will pop up as 'suggestions' in a menu under the address bar when you start typing. Someone doesn't need to be suspicious and snooping at your history to have where you've been spending your time shoved up in their face. Just something to think about when using a computer others get to see.

Sorry to hear about this, hope everything works out for the best. keep that head up, Jessie

Dearest Sam,
(Please take note: I am not a doctor. I have no diplomas to establish myself as an absolute authority on any given subject matter. )
As I read your post I noticed similarities to what I myself, and probably other members, have experienced.
Your spouse’s response to your revelations is typical. Please do not fault her for that because most people are not well informed about this type of behavior. Information they have comes from questionable sources, such as TV shows or the internet. People tend to believe everything they hear or see.
Firstly let me state unequivocally that you are a “NORMAL” human being. No doubts about that.
What you are experiencing is a “behavior”.
Some behaviors are simple in and have a well-defined purpose while others are more complex .Cross-dressing and other gender related mental issues fall into the more complex category because the clear purpose and dynamics are often clouded and difficult to define. But take heart; there is always a reason for a behavior to manifest.
I can only speak for myself.
“The catalyst for me was the experience of a traumatic series of events in my life. The resulting triple whammy threw me into a state of severe depression from which I had extreme difficulty recovering. Being a typical average everyday stubborn male I scoffed at seeking out any professional medical help and figured I could fix me. So I reached back into my past, remembering how wonderful and soothing wearing woman’s cloths was for me growing up. I opened the preverbal Pandora’s Box, not once stopping to think about how this would affect my wife, daughters, son, friends and all the people who knew me.
I didn’t care about them. All I was thinking about was me….me…ME! I was selfish and being self-centered. (I regret that now.)
Sometimes when things are really bad, people have a tendency to use “dumb” logic in order to figure out what to do. At the time I was hurting bad and needed something to feel better and be able to function again. Everything in my life seemed to be collapsing and suffocating me. I couldn’t breathe.
In my desperation I even had brief thoughts of suicide.
So I put on a dress and suddenly, like magic, I started feeling better.
At this point I should have seen the writing on the wall and bolted like an Olympic runner straight to the nearest hospital for a hefty dose of Prozac, or some other wonder drug.
No! Not me. I figured I was too smart for that. Yeah right?
My wife and children were accepting of me on the” outside”. What I couldn’t see, or didn’t want to see, was that the whole situation was tearing them apart from” within”.
The first thing that a “behavior” wants is: ACKNOWLEDGEMENT.
I was getting “acknowledgement” because….well…there I was standing in front of them in all my feminine glory and being kind of hard to overlook.
The second, and most crucial, thing a “behavior” wants is: ACCEPTANCE. (Giving a “behavior” acceptance is like feeding it a steady supply of steroids.)
In order to spare mine and forsake their own feelings, my wife and children feed me all kinds of nice compliments. They told me exactly what I wanted to hear. (I don’t fault them for that. They didn’t know what they were doing.)
The third, and final, thing a “behavior” wants is: EVERYTHING ELSE.
I’m not going to go into the details about what I’ve lost. Use your own imagination to fill in the blanks.
At some point you have to ask yourself: Was it worth it?
The answer should be: No.
I can only encourage you to seek help while you have the opportunity. Don’t be an arrogant SOB like I was.
You will save yourself a lot of regrets in the many years ahead of you.
Make the RIGHT choices NOW!

Unless you let her! You have done nothing wrong. as you go thru this you will soon learn to accept yourself. It takes a while for that. Birthdays help.

Allowing yourself to be embarrased is a handicap (IMOHO) YOU are YOU! "Don't retreat, reload!"....to quote a good friend of mine in Alaska!

If you will not let this be embarrasing...she has no power over you!

Your post really touched this old gal and If I am to blunt sorry!