The question was, "What made You who you are?
My reply, "I did!"
Jennifer Freeman
The question was, "What made You who you are?
My reply, "I did!"
Jennifer Freeman
I'd say it's genetic. Without that Y-chromosome I probably wouldn't need to be a CDer.
Beyond that, who knows?
To a very limited extent you are right that it is a state of mind - it comes from having the brain of a woman in the body of a man. Where you are wrong is in saying that having a physically female brain is not in any sense physical.Originally Posted by sissystephanie
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This above all: To thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any
Galileo said "You cannot teach a man anything" and they accuse ME of being sexist
Never ascribe to malice that which can be easily explained by sheer stupidity
Our personal grid program which is set by our DNA determines who we will be.
Second star to the right and straight on till morning
Genetics. My very young son has the same penchant for rubbing pantyhose as I did at his age. No, it's not a "feeling thing" as so many others dismiss it as. He likes specific colours. Will he grow into CDing? Not certain yet, but there are other indications he has displayed that I relate to.
ginger
i have no clue as to the how, what, when where, or why.
i have loved womens clothing for as long as i can remember, as a little kid i loved to go shopping with my mom, and aunts.
but i was number one with a bang for my grandpa, as i was his first grandson. so i just got that special place in his life, even tho i never did understand as a kid the why of it. raised in part by my grand parents and they were very hard core bible thumpers (said with respect).
so is there even a answer, or a reason for one??
i tend to believe love and respect is far more important then the draping one has on.
.
I think it was something called DNA ... :-)
DNA might be correct for those that identify as transsexuals. I'm not so sure it applies to those of us that are crossdressers with no desire to transition. I believe it is conditioning from perhaps a very early age for most of us. Here are the things that I think "conditioned" me to become a crossdresser.
1. my kindergarten teacher's hose, garter tabs, lacy slip that I saw and touched while under her desk.
age 4.
2. seeing a teen boy walking down the street with his shirt unbuttoned and his bra showing clearly.
age 10-11
3. Seeing a picture of what looked like several naked women sitting on a blanket at the beach with well formed breasts and down below they had male parts. Also at age 10-11
4. Finding my mother's full nylon white slip hanging on a hook in the bathroom that for whatever reason I touched myself with and had my first ever orgasm.
Age 11.
5. Finding a box with female clothes stored in an empty apartment above our garage that for some reason I tried them on and became very sexually excited. Did that several times, not knowing how many times or what drew me to do it and feeling very weird, alone and scared each time I put the clothes on. Always ending with an orgasm and removing the clothes as fast as I could.
6. What I think was a very high, maybe unusual attraction to women and girls and their clothes, makeup and curves that males lacked.
7. Maybe having lost my dad due to an accident at age 10 had something to do with it. thus having only my mother to look up to and be raised by (2 older brothers, but not male role models in any way)
8. Having much love and respect for my mother and the things she taught me at an early age. (she died when I was only 16) I also remember a few other adult women that I strongly admired both physically and emotionally.
9. Having learned early to always respect all girls and women. Chivalry was taught to me at a very early age.
To sum it up, all these things had to have played a role in my being a life long crossdresser; Even long before I knew there was others that do it or that there was even a name for it.
Cthulhu commands me.
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn
Growing up I had a lot of feminine reinforcement. I always felt like I was a girl and I don't believe that part came from anyone but me. My father tried to 'macho' me to death but I somehow was able to reject or ignore all that. I could've rejected CDing completely but being the experimenter that I was I hit the combo in CDing that absolutely hooked me for good.
All the things that led to my CDing are kind of difficult for me to wrap my head around. On the one hand I'd like to understand it all but then again do I really, really care?
I don't think I really care why. It's right for me and that's all that matters. Right? I'm me when I dress and I'm happy when I dress. The reason (why) may be too much to deal with. I don't need to go that deep.
I see people trying to explain away their feelings; chemicals in the womb, childhood struggles, domineering mother, etc. as making excuses for their behavior/sexual preference/perceived gender. "It's not my fault! Something else made me do it!" You know what? I don't need an excuse for the way I am. Did I have a hard life? Yes. However, I love who I am and what I do. Therefore, I can't look back on that life - and everything that made me who and what I am - harshly. What made me who I am? I did, and I'm damn proud of it!
Kathi
God post Kathi. I agree completely. But as for me, I am not making excuses at all. I have no problem accepting me as I am and would not want to change a thing about who I am today.
As I look back on my past, there are some things I wish were different or that I would have done differently. Hard times? Sure, I have had my share. But I agree it all is what makes me the person I am today. I think I am a better person for all the things I have experienced in my life...both good and bad.
I don't know if I can say it made me who I am, but my mother and her sister having dressed me in my cousin's clothes (most memorably, to my impressionable young mind, her panties) certainly opened my mind to the possibilities. Like most of us, I had been taught that girls were different and that boys just didn't do certain things, but after that, I knew that girl clothes could fit a boy, and I couldn't see why I couldn't wear them.
I have been thinking back on my childhood recently, and have come to realize: The girls around me in my age group knew, the whole time, even at 7 or 8, even if they never saw me in a dress. I was always the only boy invited to the girls' birthday parties, girls were always inviting me to come over and play, a few even asked if they could dress me in their clothes. They knew I was different, in that way girls just know. I wonder how many of them would be surprised.
Why doesn't come into play anymore. I am what I am! I am more than a cross-dresser. I am a package deal, except sometimes the wrapping paper is pink!
Did you choose to make yourself white American as well? If so, good for you, how did you go about choosing what the natural colour of your skin would be?
Those of us who are transsexual have as much influence over our inner gender as you have over the natural colour of your skin. We don't need your condescension telling us that we are making excuses for our "perceived gender".
It is bad enough facing intolerance from the majority of people who are merely ignorant of the facts without having members of this community putting us down as well.
You are right that we do have to choose what we do about our birth defect and I will acknowledge that a small number of people manage to live their whole lives without the defect driving them to the edge of suicide. My choice was to live and therefore to correct the birth defect, but it was a close call and for a long time looked like going the other way. I dare say that you would have been even more patronising about that choice.
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This above all: To thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any
Galileo said "You cannot teach a man anything" and they accuse ME of being sexist
Never ascribe to malice that which can be easily explained by sheer stupidity
I agree with Stephanie, but sometimes the wrapping is Lavender. I'm not so sure we all have a choice, Is picking between depression, and thoughts of suicide, and finding true contentment, really a choice? Being one of the members here that feels driven to dress, I always am surprised my those that do it just because they like to. I don't mean to offend anyone but if I had a choice I would have been all man, or all woman, either would have been fine with me, but I fell somewhere in betwen. In sixty years I have come to accept that as a fact, it's just how I feel inside. But if I could have been one or the other, I know I would have had a very different life. There is just somethings that you want to do in life that this gets in the way of. When you have skeletons in the closet, you have to guard the door. Now what I believe is a choice, is how you learn to live with being Transgendered, but the being trans, is not a choice for me, it's a fact.
Tina B.
Rianna, are you making excuses for who and how you are? Then the post wasn't about you! I wasn't trying to insult or malign you, so calm down. All I'm saying is to stop blaming outside things for making us who we are and own them.
Kathi
Life experiences and a portal known as my mirror through which I travel to my parallel universe.
We were born that way just like gays and lesbians. At 3 or 4 years old I tried on my little playmates girl shoes and at that early age it was such an exciting/exzilerating feeling that I didn't want togive her shoes back. At 11 or 12 it returned when I would play with a small blanket wrapped around me, like a skirt. And yes that sexual exciting feeling was there. We're just blessed with the desires of both male and female, the rest of the population are limited to just one. Now, isn't two better than one, it feels so good I don't want to change. What would be even better is to be very attractive dressed as either male or female.
I do make reference to what happened in the womb as part of the explanation for who I am. The text I quoted specifically cited that as making excuses for ... "perceived gender".
Whether or not you were targetting me personally, your words encompassed me and were unwelcome
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This above all: To thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any
Galileo said "You cannot teach a man anything" and they accuse ME of being sexist
Never ascribe to malice that which can be easily explained by sheer stupidity
There could be a lot of factors that led to my TG state of affairs. On the "nature" side, it could be genetic (two close blood relatives are either bisexual or gay). On the "nuture" side, I didn't have much in the way of male role models (except my grandfather, who didn't live anywhere near long enough) when I was a young 'un.
I don't sweat it too much - I am who I am, and I am coming to terms with it.
No, I certainly wasn't as I hadn't read your reply fully, so I didn't see the magic phrase, 'perceived gender' in your post. Sorry (again) if you were offended. Maybe I'm just sick of the whole legal system over here where a rapist claims innocence because he was abused as a child or something like that. Whatever happened to personal responsibility? I believe that we are who we are. No one made us this way. Stop making excuses. Why does our behavior need an excuse anyway? Why do we keep looking for answers externally?
Kathi
For me I think it is about cromosomes. I would be surprised if it wasnt.
Kathi is absolutely right. We are who we are only because of who we are!! No external, or internal in the womb, stuff made us crossdressers! We did, because we put on the feminine clothes!! There is no other reason!
And Rianna, this is not a slam at you but you do post a lot of so-called reasons why you did a transition!! You did it and I am proud of you for doing it! I have never seen any evidence, from medical people, that any man was born with a female brain. That is probably because the brain does not have any sexual connotation. It is physical, but neither male or female. The way we, as individuals, think is what makes it more of one than the other! And when you are born you do not have that power to think in a way that will accomplish anything. You have to be older!! So once again it is US, the individual who detirmines who and what we are!! Nothing else does, unless the person has SRS surgery!! And that is the persons choice!!
Stephanie
Lady on the outside, but man underneath!
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