Why be a woman?

[BRANDYJ]

In reading all the responses, it is clear that we have those that are TS and those that are CD. So a line is drawn between the differences of what we think is the reason to want to become women. The CD responses clearly are from those of us that want to be part time women. The responses from our TS's not only want, but need to be women. Most of us CD's do not want a man or are attracted to them, while I would think that those that are TS and have undergone hormone and surgical transition,are attracted to, and want a man.
Simply stated, the reasons for CD's and TS's are very different. The TS feels they were born in the wrong body and most knew it at a very early age. So the CD might want to be a woman (part time), while the TS NEEDS to be a woman (full time).
For us CD'ers, the jury is still out whether our being a CD was something that happened in the womb or from early socialization.

[Sammy777]

OK, I just didn't get it at all... wanted to make sure you didn't think I was gonna kill myself :P

Yes that was a BAD joke trying to imply that he's not going to be your last B/F and the only way he would be was if you were to off yourself.

Perhaps a better line might have been:
Love lasts forever, to bad I can't say the same for relationships. lol

[Bree-asaurus]

Yes that was a BAD joke trying to imply that he's not going to be your last B/F and the only way he would be was if you were to off yourself.

Perhaps a better line might have been:
Love lasts forever, to bad I can't say the same for relationships. lol

Gotcha lol

I dunno... I like to hope for the best

[Aprilrain]

No- i don't think men are all bad- some of the thing they do are necessary- i'd just prefer to be on the prettier side.

us heterosexual girls know what men are good for!

[Sammy777]

Most of us CD's do not want a man or are attracted to them, while I would think that those that are TS and have undergone hormone and surgical transition,are attracted to, and want a man.

Where to begin?????
One - Not all TS' are attracted to men, nor do we become attracted to them because of the hormones. Those of us that "become" attracted to men have always been that way.
Sexuality does not change, period.

TWO - You imply the whole reason behind going through all this shit is just so we can get a man.

If "most" of "us CD'ers" are not attracted to men then why so many "I want to be with a man"
[But only when dressed, because otherwise that would be soo gay] threads on here?

Narrow minded hurtful Stereotypes sting don't they?

[Pamela Julie]

Speaking for myself, i dress like a woman because I am a woman. Somehow I was assigned the wrong physical parts at birth.

Pamela

[Aprilrain]

Most of us CD's do not want a man or are attracted to them,
those that are TS and have undergone hormone and surgical transition,are attracted to, and want a man.

these are two rather tired assumptions.
at the support group I attend I'm a novelty being hetero, most of the girls are lesbians or are asexual
there are plenty of gay CDs, and i bet half of the "hetero" CDs have very repressed homosexual desires.

[Annaliese2010]

I believe [almost] everything has a grey area or a sliding scale to it.
In thinking about the OP's question I came up with the [over simplified] diagram below.

"Please excuse the crudity of this model, I didn't have time to build it to scale or to paint it."
Dr Emmet Brown



“If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself.” Albert Einstein.

Wow Sammy that's awesome, girl! Couldn't agree with you more!

[carhill2mn]

Hi Katie, if you should ever come to understand why you desire to crossdress there are many here that would like for you to share that information with them.

Your question as to why you do not understand why "we would like to become women", quite nicely describes the difference
between feeling that you should have been born a girl instead of a boy vs. liking the feeling of being able to dress and look like a woman some of the time, ie., crossdressing vs. sex or gender change (transexual).

[carhill2mn]

these are two rather tired assumptions.
at the support group I attend I'm a novelty being hetero, most of the girls are lesbians or are asexual
there are plenty of gay CDs, and i bet half of the "hetero" CDs have very repressed homosexual desires.

Hi April, I am curious as to what type of "support group" it is that you attend.

[Da_vida]

For me it is important to understand what I do and why I do it. As the old adage goes "know thy self." As a PhD level psychologist I attempted to find a satisfying psychological explanation to no avail. However I did eventually come to a satisfying explanation that relates to the spiritual dimension of life and gives me a way of putting my seemingly "out of step" thoughts and urges in perspective. For anyone willing to read two pages of text, I've attached a fuller explanation of my unconventional answer to my life's biggest question.

Davida

[Lynn Marie]

I really don't understand why we like to become women. I can understand that our love of women's clothes may motivate us to wear them, but I don't understand the motive behind becoming a woman. I'm a man, I identify as such, I have no desire to live as a girl in the slightest, and yet I want to put on makeup and a wig and become Katie. Why would we want to become women? I don't understand my desire to crossdress at all. It's something about me I really want to figure out

[SIZE="4"]Very well put, especially for a 20 year old. I feel just like you do, and I'm 68 years old! I don't have any answers either. The only difference is that I'm not trying to figure it out any more. I just don't really care. I'm just enjoying it.[/SIZE]

[Launa]

If I were ever to figure out the answer to this question then I should be one rich dude or chick.

[Sammy777]

I find that dressing relaxes me

Dressing up and being Rachel with my wife gives me such a feeling of relief, of warmth, of affirmation.

I prefer female values - loving, nurturing, taking care, as opposed to male values - dominating, destroying, generally being an idiot; no contest really.

I prefer to be one of the caring women because I just love their inner and outer beauty.
I just feel better mentally when I'm dressed.

Crosssdressing allows me to be soft.

What is so wrong with having these thoughts, feelings or values that the only way they can be expressed is while wearing a dress?

It begs the question? If these are things deemed "not manly enough" to do then why do something deemed even more "not manly" to express them?

One might well ask why women, when wearing pants, their SO's shirt, or even unisex wear like sweats, don't suddenly start exhibing stereotypical (deliberate word choice here) male behavior.

Because when women wear such clothes we are not trying to look, act, copy, emulate, worship, be seen as or taken for men. That's why. They are just clothes to us.

Crossdressing is like having your cake and being able to eat it too.
I know lots of women already doing it and they love it.

Is the "All woman cross dress" dead horse EVER going to stop being kicked in here?

I can also attest that what I'm wearing has very little to do with how I'm feeling on a day to day basis.

Being a woman isn't about wearing panties, nylons and heels...

Both very true statements. I do not feel any more or less "womanly" based on the type of clothes I wear or the color my panties under them happen to be that day.

[Aprilrain]

Hi April, I am curious as to what type of "support group" it is that you attend.

a TS support group..................

[Sammy777]

Wow Sammy that's awesome, girl! Couldn't agree with you more!

Awwww Thank You Anna

[jillleanne]

Ah grasshopper,

The secret to finding the answer lies only within. Once you accept who you are, you will find your answer.

[Veronica27]

I really don't understand why we like to become women. I can understand that our love of women's clothes may motivate us to wear them, but I don't understand the motive behind becoming a woman. I'm a man, I identify as such, I have no desire to live as a girl in the slightest, and yet I want to put on makeup and a wig and become Katie. Why would we want to become women? I don't understand my desire to crossdress at all. It's something about me I really want to figure out

I have read through all the replies, and just as we all have different reasons for being crossdressers, we all bring our own biases to the keyboard when reading and responding to posts such as this one. When I read the question "Why be a woman", I could see several different possible interpretations, depending on what was to follow in the post. It could cover anything from pretending to be one, to undergoing radical surgery to actually be one.

I came to the conclusion that Katie is simply stating that she has an unfathomable desire to crossdress (which can be interpreted as becoming a woman), and yet this uncontrollable desire does not in any way lead to any desire to actually be a woman. Any crossdresser, who crossdresses fully with wig, forms, name etc. is portraying a woman, (i.e. becoming one), but is not necessarily "being" one in the sense of expressing his own internal feminine need to be one, sense that he is one, or gender confusion as to his real status. Katie can not understand the motivation behind this desire to "become", complete with wig etc., when there is no actual desire to "be". She can correct me if I have misunderstood her question.

The question as to why has no one correct answer, and is in fact a question with a dual meaning. Why can mean either "cause" or "effect". The jury is definitely still out as to the cause of our crossdressing. There are biological, behavioural, cultural, environmental and psychological considerations that may or may not play a part in any individual circumstance. We argue about these causes at great length on these types of forums, but few of us could ever be considered as "experts" in any of these fields and our arguments are primarily speculation. I detected very little of this in the current thread however.

The other "why" is the effect. We crossdress because we enjoy it is the simple answer and is the effect. However, because of the taboo nature of crossdressing from a societal point of view, that answer is not considered to be sufficient as it would be for something acceptable like golf or stamp collecting. So we delve into our own mind, and try to explain our various forms of enjoyment, and in so doing, often subconciously attempt to turn such an effect into a cause. At that point, our reasons become justifications.

To get back to Katie's question, the need we feel to justify tends to be more readily satisfied by the speculative nature of our "causal" arguments, than by our feeble attempts to explain our taboo defying enjoyment. Thus some of the replies are of the "because I am a woman" nature or else of the "I don't care why, I just do" nature. The remainder try to explain their reasons for enjoyment, but these are all highly subjective and therefore cannot provide any overall answers to the basic general question.

The replies that I most enjoyed were the ones that equate crossdressing to the natural heterosexual male admiration of and attraction to womanhood. These were explaining a possible psychological cause of crossdressing and were the few that tackled any of the causal side of why. As children, those of us who have been around a while can remember that much of our childhood play involved "let's pretend", whether it be cowboys and indians, cops and robbers, pirates, moms and dads, doctors and nurses or anything else. For us it was usually what we had just seen at the Saturday matinees. For modern kids, the pretend is mostly taking the controls of some video game, but the concept remains the same. Why are many of us afraid to admit that we are simply playing a form of let's pretend when we crossdress. Not everyone is, of course, but many including myself are.

Veronica

[sissystephanie]

I have been a crossdresser for over 60 years, and have never had any desire to be a woman! But like all males, I do have a feminine side and sometimes I do like to show it off! I love to wear feminine clothes, simply because of the fit, feel, and look of them. But even though in the past I did dress totally enfemme, complete with wig and makeup, I was not trying to be a girl!! I was just dressing like one, which I still do. However, now that my dear wife has passed on I no longer wear makeup or a wig when I am dressed enfemme. That of course includes when I am out in public. I go out as the guy that I am, but wearing feminine clothing from the skin out!! And in almost 7 years I have never had a negative comment!

[Rachel Flowers]

I've never found it easy, all my life, to associate much with other men. Their conversation, their attitudes, the "punchiness", the constant tussle for Alpha status. Through my work, first in accountancy, later in training & development, I've been able to associate with women generally and meet men who don't meet your (sexist, come on) sterotype, Patsy. Men like me. I don't know how many of them dress and it doesn't matter. I know men who are loving nurturing and caring. And I've met women who are aggressive, competitive, destructive.

But I'll give you this: almost every idiot I've ever met has been the owner of a penis. Perhaps that's where the term "dickhead" comes from.

[Richelle423]

I am proud to be a man.(I am a butcher by trade).My dressing just balances everything out.(when I'm outta work).

[Donna1391]

Hey it(feels sooo good) I love dressing up. I feel good about my self Hugs Donna1391

[BRANDYJ]

Where to begin?????
One - Not all TS' are attracted to men, nor do we become attracted to them because of the hormones. Those of us that "become" attracted to men have always been that way.
Sexuality does not change, period.

TWO - You imply the whole reason behind going through all this shit is just so we can get a man.

If "most" of "us CD'ers" are not attracted to men then why so many "I want to be with a man"
[But only when dressed, because otherwise that would be soo gay] threads on here?

Narrow minded hurtful Stereotypes sting don't they?

Hi Sammy, I surely did not mean to imply that all TS's go through transition just to get a man. I know better... Poor wording on my part. And you have enlightened me. I have read that "some" TS's become attracked to men after transition. so you are saying that all TS's were in fact attracted to men even before hormones and transition? OK, got it. And you are correct about the amount of CDers that seem to be attracted to men ONLY when dressed. Seems like quite a few of us. As for being narrow minded goes...Sorry that's not me if that's what you were implying. I have a tremenous amount of respect for all TS's; along with a lot of compassion for what they go through. Sorry you misunderstood the point of my post.

[Annaliese2010]

For me it is important to understand what I do and why I do it. As the old adage goes "know thy self." As a PhD level psychologist I attempted to find a satisfying psychological explanation to no avail. However I did eventually come to a satisfying explanation that relates to the spiritual dimension of life and gives me a way of putting my seemingly "out of step" thoughts and urges in perspective. For anyone willing to read two pages of text, I've attached a fuller explanation of my unconventional answer to my life's biggest question.

Davida

I read through your Reflections with great interest because you are a PhD psychologist, Davida. It is interesting and worth the read if for no other reason then how well you express yourself and your personal quest for an explanation to the duality you experience day by day beginning at a very young age and persisting through time all the way to the present. If adopting the reincarnation myth in an 'as if true' manner helps you make sense of the world then this is of great value to you personally and I am glad for you. I have a very strong background in the so called 'hard sciences' but remain open minded about such possibilities as reincarnation and the like. While reductionist thinking and the classic scientific method of Western Science has greatly expanded our understanding of the world & our relation to it, this method alone is clearly not the be-all end-all avenue leading to a more comprehensive grasp of 'reality'.

And yet, IMHO, neither is purely traditional Eastern thought. I find something lacking in ancient Eastern mythology no matter how elaborate and steeped in tradition are its ideas & precepts, the restating of these using terminology borrowed from quantum physics notwithstanding. No disrespect but I am immediately skeptical of books entitled 'Physics Of the Soul'...just a wee bit pretentious IMHO (lol), but probably sells big in India, I presume. Then again, who really knows anything about anything once you cross that line where direct observation is no longer possible i.e. leave the objective realm and dive into the deeply subjective.

It is a vast unexplored territory, the further one goes the less consensus there is, everything cloaked and confused by ancient terms and concepts that have no more bearing in this, the 21st century. A brave new world for professionals such as you, I would say. Exciting times, these! The net sum of all knowledge doubling at ever shorter intervals in our head-long pursuit of understanding on all fronts, those that involve the depth, scope and breadth of the workings of the human mind, no doubt the most challenging of all disciplines. Kudos to you, Davida, for your work at the vanguard of such a profound endeavor! In my opinion what is needed is to objectify the subjective, as far as this is possible...by some sort of systematic mapping of deeply subjective states using specific terminology as is standard practice in the 'hard sciences' of physics, chemistry, medical science etc, where terms have highly defined universally agreed upon meaning eg. the IUPAC for the field of Chemistry.

The futurist/scientist/prognosticator & author Ray Kurzweil, often the subject of articles in Wired magazine, has a female couinterpart (Veronica, I think..) and would agree with the main thrust of your Reflections though perhaps not so much with the reincarnation aspect of it.

Anyways, just saying...was interesting reading your article. Thnx for putting it out there girl!

[Davena Doll]

I like to dress and act like a woman, to have sex with my BF