Wife has again asked for divorce, this time telling a friend. She refused to tell the friend why. So I was wondering, from those who have been thru divorce, what explanation for the divorce was told to friends/family? How many were first exposed this way vs a cover story?
Thanks for any insight - my first time thru this.
Ellen
I don't have any answers for you I'm afraid. I just wanted to offer a my sympathies.
Hug
Rita
A person should wear what he likes to. And not just what other folks say. A person should be who she likes to. A person's a person that way!
~Marlo Thomas~
I would say it depends on what the real reason is. If its your CD-ing and you're not out, thats one thing. If its something else less incriminating, tell the truth. My ex turned into a psycho-bitch from hell, just no way to deal with it, enough is enough.
Sorry for you ClosetED. Whatever the reasons divorce is emotionally and financially draining.
Although my ex blamed my dressing for leaving me, there were other factors at play. But to answer your question, I have no clue what she told her friends but she didn't bring anything out in court, etc. She had promised me that when we talked some time before about CDing and there was also the threat that my livelihood could be impacted and therefore she'd suffer too.
Really though every situation and everyone is different so you can't infer to your wife what other experience.
If you still get along with each other you can just simply tell people you have drifted apart and no longer love each other. If she is spiteful, good luck!
As my Forum name implies, I am in the closet. We are on good terms, so it can be amicable. After 25 years of what everyone considered a perfect marriage, most will have hard time believing we should divorce. We are freshly empty nestes, so we can try to blame that. I think it is only CDing and trust issues regarding that. She says I am a perfect person, and the only other perfect person, Jesus, look what they did to him. I do not point out that he walked around in a gown/dress...
Irreconcilable differences
The simplest is ... "irreconcilable differences". End of story
Last edited by Lorileah; 09-23-2014 at 11:41 AM. Reason: no need to quote OP
I don't wear women's clothes, I wear MY clothes !
I have nothing as to what to say to what to tell friend, I do offer my hope for you and your future, that you work through this and come out stronger.
Why feel a need to offer a reason, just say it is a personal issue and no one else needs to know why.
I agree with Cheryl. "Irreconcilable differences" fits the bill. I went back and read some of your comments. You have my sympathies. You're another marriage destroyed because you like to wear women's clothing on occasion. Twenty-five years thrown away and your wife does not even want to consider marital counseling? What a pity? I suspect your wife believes she will be looked down upon by family and community because "Egad! She married to a cross dresser! What's wrong with HER?" It may be too late, but, I would really suggest counseling with a therapist specializing with gender issues. Another perfect husband thrown away because of one issue. What a pity! I wish you good luck.
I read your comments on another thread concerning an activity that may divert your attention from cross dressing. I suspect I'm a little older than you. I've been able to balance my life. There is just too much stimuli in society to run from cross dressing. Just going to the mall and sitting down and sipping a cup of coffee is too much. Pretty women, tastefully attired, nice makeup, nice hair.....stimuli. I watch the Today Show..more stimuli. I love Wheel of Fortune...more stimuli. The mind craves to let Stephanie out. I have chores. I have hobbies. You may be able to minimize your en femme time. You may be able to minimize body modification...hair removal. But, you can never banish her from your inner self. Your wife needs to know your inner self cannot be changed.
I feel the need because family are likely to ask why when we are so perfect together. And just saying "irreconcilable differences", while incomplete for the legal papers (which want a paragraph about why), family are likely to press for more specifics. Over 1.5 years of both going to therapy has not solved it.
Ellen
My ex just told people that I lied to her about wanting kids (we were supposed to wait 5 years after getting married, then try to have children, so when that didn't happen, she had 'evidence' of my supposed lying to her about that), and that she didn't love me anymore because she didn't believe that I loved her, or would ever want kids. While I was going back to school and working full time, she decided she wanted someone else instead of me, and filed for divorce as soon as I finished school. She blackmailed me during the divorce, saying that if I did not give her what she wanted, she would out me to everyone. So basically I took a huge financial burden, she got all the assets, I got...all the debt. But no alimony or anything. So I started my divorced life in a huge mountain of debt. As far as I know, she never told anyone, so at least she kept her end of the deal.
Some causes of crossdressing you've probably never even considered: My TG biography at:http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/...=1#post1490560
There's an addendum at post # 82 on that thread, too. It's about a ten minute read.
Why don't we understand our desire to dress, behave and feel like a girl? Because from childhood, boys are told that the worst possible thing we can be, is a sissy. This feeling is so ingrained into our psyche, that we will suppress any thoughts that connect us to being or wanting to be feminine, even to the point of creating separate personalities to assign those female feelings into.
First it is none of their business. It only matters to you and your spouse. Second, if you must say something. say "Things are not as they always appear." or "We grew apart, it was good but we need to move on"Originally Posted by ClosetED
The earth is the mother of all people and all people should have equal rights upon it.
Chief Joseph
Nez Perce
“Love isn't a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.” - Fred Rogers,
Reasons are no one else's business. I just said, "she didn't want to be married any more".
Jodi
Ellen, I'm sorry to hear of your troubles, I'll remember you in my prayers!
Hugs, Bria
Thank you. Family will ask. I don't want to lay blame on any one person, so "she didn't want to be married any more" or "he left me" makes it harder to be amicable. "We grew apart" due to empty nest is more acceptable and non-directional for blame.
Been through it twice. Dressing had nothing to do with it either time. My sympathies to you. It sux at first but it WILL get better.
Joni
I truly feel for you. Can I hope that the " perfect couple " can somehow agree that 25 years of love trumps any anxiety about your cding? Peace, mel
It is nobody's business but yours. I hate to see a divorce happen, but if it does then the quicker you leave it behind you the better. "Irreconcilable differences" covers it and if anyone presses further say "I won't discuss it."
Of course, your spouse is not bound by this and might spread her version around. If so, you do not need to do the same. Take the high road and get on with life.
Eryn
"These girls have the most beautiful dresses. And so do I! How about that!" [Kaylee, in Firefly] [SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
"What do you care what other people think?" [Arlene Feynman, to her husband Richard]
"She's taller than all the women in my family, combined!" [Howard, in The Big Bang Theory]
"Tall, tall girl. The woman could hunt geese with a rake!" [Mary Cooper, in The Big Bang Theory]
Divorce is always messy. You clearly have my sympathy.
If there are children involved it will hit them the hardest and that's clearly the worst part.
For you, the next to worst part is you can't control what the other person says or tells others - about you.
You can always hope they aren't as much of a 'nutjob' as mine was.
She was 'too hot for Jerry Springer' with her business and no - I'm not just saying that either.
As I noted in another thread, my ex used my CDing as a weapon during our divorce, but it was for naught. It's not a crime, so despite telling everyone including my kids, friends and coworkers, my life went on and she got nothing for being vengeful.
Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual, you have an obligation to be one.
Eleanor Roosevelt
Your wife set the tone by refusing to tell a friend the reason. Likely best to do the same: "This is a private matter between me and (my wife), and I prefer not to discuss it" might be a polite yet firm reply to any requests for information. It really is nobody's business.
Wishing you well.
Ineke
Ed, here's a radical thought...do a pre-emptive strike and tell all of your friends and family that you are transgender, that you have hidden this fact from the world all your life, that your wife could no longer deal with all that, and that by and large, this is the main reason why she is asking for a divorce. I realize that you are deeply closeted and that this may represent a huge leap of faith for you to accomplish, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Doing so will also put the onus on her to defend her actions, and that is exactly where the blame should lie.
Times have changed since you first got married, and being transgender and/or a crossdresser no longer carries the same stigma it once did. Your wife was socialized in an era where crossdresser = "transvestite" = pervert, and she never moved past that point. Sadly for her, the world has passed her by, and she has not kept up with the seismic shift in acceptance of the LGBT community over the last 20 years or so. Psychologists and the medical community are now in agreement that there is nothing fundamentally "wrong" with people who are homosexual or transgender - we are simply wired differently and have no control over what nature or the genetic lottery pre-ordained for us. This is who we "are"...the best we can do is "manage" our dysphoria so that it does not adversely affect our day-to-day lives, nor lead us to depression or suicide.
I think that if you take that gut-wrenching step, you will find to your surprise that most people these days have a pretty good idea of what it means to be transgender because of the explosion of coverage of this topic by the media in recent years, and what challenges we face accordingly. And that, in turn, will lead to an outpouring of sympathy for the struggle that you have faced in trying to manage your demons, and it will be your wife who is the pariah at the end of the day for having shown herself to what amounts to be a "hater".
Perhaps I sound a bit strident here, but what Stephanie47 said in a previous post really struck a chord with me, and I find myself sharing her anger at seeing yet another case here of a fundamentally good man being thrown to the wolves simply because he is a crossdresser, and where his spouse has drawn a line in the sand because of some medieval attitudes towards his pre-disposition that she cannot shake.
I can also relate to your situation on a personal level to some degree. While my wife and I continue to be locked in DADT mode (her choice, not mine) over my crossdressing after 43 years of marriage for many of the same reasons that you have encountered, at least divorce is not on the table in our case due to it, and she has slowly been softening her stance towards this albeit still at a glacial pace. Remarkable what a sobering effect realizing that we are entering the twilight of our lives can have, that our days are numbered, and that things which seemed so important or earth-shattering once upon a time now no longer carry the same weight or relevance.
Ed, you have allowed yourself to become the helpless victim here, and that is wrong, wrong, wrong. You need to take the initiative, fight to save your marriage, and with the undoubted support of your friends and family - prove to your wife that she is on the wrong side of history in her aversion to your crossdressing.
The days when people allowed themselves to be blackmailed and have their lives and careers ruined because they were homosexual are over, and the same thing is happening now with transgender individuals like ourselves. And once you "out" yourself in this manner and finally become true to yourself, you will be amazed at the degree of inner peace that you will achieve as a result - and maybe even save your marriage in the process because you have become a better person for it .
How about "social pressure to conform" on her part, "the establishment", "the status quo"?
T-shirt says: "Hi, I Crossdress!"
Posting Permissions
