Why didn't you tell me

[Sometimes Steffi]

That was my wife's question.

Why didn't you tell me before we got married? I'm not sure what I would have done ...

My reason/excuse is that I didn't really know myself that well. I thought I was the only one in the world.

OK. I understand that should I get into another relationship, I should disclose fully and early. But, what about in 1978.

How many of you disclosed before marriage? How many of you disclosed before 1985, to be arbitrary?

[Beverley Sims]

I was fortunate it was known before I got married.

Since 1978 times and situations have changed, A LOT.

[Linda E. Woodworth]

I told my future wife in college while we were dating. We were walking back to the campus and I had this overwhelming urge to tell her. She took it nonchalantly and we went on with out lives.

As the years went on and my dressing developed and increased her acceptance level lowered. As time went on she became convinced I was heading towards transitioning and SRS. (NOTE: nothing can be farther from the truth. I just like to wear women's clothing)

My therapist, God bless her, meet my wife privately and settled everything out. While it isn't a perfect arrangement I am able to dress at home when I have time and the kids are away. In the mornings it's Linda whose exercising in leotard and tights with light makeup.

[Amanda L.]

Yep Steffi can relate to this situation.
My reply?
Hell I didn't know myself until recently (relatively). How can you disclose what your not? When I married my wife cross dressing and transgenderism weren't in my vocabulary. Any past behaviours were dead and buried.....so I thought

[Katey888]

Steffi,

It's an unfair question in the context of knowledge of transgenderism and crossdressing at that time... It's a little better now, but still has a long way to go...

I thought this would go away - in fairness, it has done for much of my relationship life, and it's been controlled during a focus on family and career... How can you tell about what neither you nor the psycho-medical community at the time was fully understanding of..? (And isn't even today..?) No disclosure here; ever - and my answers would be:

I thought I could control it and it would go away for good...

I didn't want to embarrass you or me and I was ashamed and guilty about something that seems so weird and inexplicable...

I didn't want to lose you and was prepared to not tell to keep you...

Katey x

[mechamoose]

I will add to Katey's reply.

You were not sure. You didn't know how pervasive it was. You didn't realize it was a personhood issue instead of just a fetish.

When you are truly in love with someone, you make sacrifices to keep that relationship safe, even at great personal cost.

My opinion is that you were not trying to deceive her, you were trying to protect her from something that you were not sure was 'real'.

- MM

[kimdl93]

Long before1985 and again before 2000...that is once at the beginning of my first marriage and before I was engaged to my present wife. The reveal with my first wife was after she had figured it out for herself...she had coaxed me into putting on her bra and panties for some bedroom play, and my enthusiasm gave me away. I told her what I knew, so far as I knew it, but didn't tell her my fears..that I might be 'one of them'. Many years later that marriage failed for other reasons, and in contemplating a second marriage I told everything I knew...at the time.

People change, people learn and grow. You have and you're not exactly the person that married in 1978. Internet or not, we all learn more, explore and discover or reveal things about ourselves. You've answered your wife's question in a truthful manner. She may not be happy about the answer, but if she chooses to be angry for choices she made 36 years ago, that's not going to make her life any better. Neither will making you suffer for not telling what you didn't know.

[JamieG]

Hi Steffi,

This was the big question from my wife too. And it was one that took us many years to get past. My answer is the same as many of the others: I didn't realize how deep it went. I lived alone for 8 years before marrying my wife, and although I had a small stash during that period, I only dressed occasionally. I never felt the need to meet other CDs or to get out in public.

What changed? It's hard to say. Was it that no longer having the freedom to dress as I pleased, made it more important to me? Was it that I had finally proven myself as a man by getting married, so I was now secure to explore my femininity? Was it the ready access to a closet full of clothes? Or was it simply that I changed as I got older? I can't really say. But soon after I realized how big of a problem it was, I knew I needed to tell her. It took me a while to work out how to do so. By the way, this wasn't until 2002 that I disclosed.

Jamie

[StacyPump]

Hi Steffi. I did not openly disclose my desires to my wife before we got married. We did do some mild experimentation in the bedroom before marriage, and in the years since then, but I did not understand what this would ultimately mean for me, and so fear of losing her, and embarrassment and shame, kept me from discussing it openly.

I disclosed my crossdressing to my wife, and admitted it openly to myself, about 2 years ago, after 17 years of marriage. Though it feels good to finally be honest about it, It has been very hard for my wife, and in counseling she has said to me that she is not sure that she can live with it.

Just this past week, she talked to her best friend about this, with my blessing. I know that she resents having to live with this "secret", so I encouraged her to find somebody that she can talk to about it. I don't yet know the complete text of the conversation, but in an interesting twist, her friend told her that another friend had recently confided in her with a similar story.

We are not alone!

[Cheryl T]

I disclosed once and it was well before 1985 and it was a "crash and burn" situation. It ended a relationship that was on it's way to marriage.

The second time around I chose to hide it and protect the love I had found. Luckily for me it all worked out in the end.

[CONSUELO]

I did disclose well before thoughts of marriage. She was staying with me and when I was at work she searched through drawers and cupboards. She said she found lots of panties in my underwear drawer and decided that was OK. This was back in the very late 1970's.

At that time I did not understand how my cross dressing would develop and become more intense. I had no good literature and no access to a knowledgeable therapist.

Soon after marriage I found that even being around her in panties was offensive. I just do what I want now and dress frequently and openly. Needless to say the reception is a bit frosty.
I just wish that I knew then what I know about myself now. It still would have been very difficult as there was a strong emotional attachment that seemed big enough to overcome the cross dressing. I hope that no young cross dressers act as ignorantly as I did. With the huge amount of knowledge out there people should be able to make much wiser decisions but I wonder if they will.

[Lorileah]

First marriage- didn't tell, mostly because I really wasn't active and she liked really macho guys. (Lasted about 2 years)

Second marriage- didn't have to tell, there were little hints that let her know. Somewhere around 1977 she let me own some underwear, some where around 1980 she bought me Candies shoes, somewhere around 1985 I had a few skirts. (marriage was 27 years, together 32)

Last relationship (not married) I revealed everything BEFORE we even met in person. She loved Lori (relationship was 15 years)

[sometimes_miss]

My answer to the same question was, I thought I was over it. I hadn't crossdressed for several years at that point, so I really believed that I had 'beaten it'. Kind of like anything else. If you haven't done it and haven't had any interest in doing it for several years, it just seems like something that should remain in the past. Let's try another example, one that's pretty common. Suppose when you were younger, you masturbated while looking at playboy magazines, or even sears catalogs. How many people tell their wives about that? After all, you don't do it anymore. It's something that a lot of us might feel was just a phase we were going through, and we out grew it. So we looked at it like something we went through growing up, akin to the old 'sowing our wild oats'. It comes under the category of, no one tells our mate everything. It would take years to cover everything. So we tell what we believe they should know. And we can't know what other people feel is important or not.

[Annaliese]

I got married in 1975, no, nothing, out there for what I was, would go away, could handle it, had not a clue. What was I going to tell her, I did not even know what it was my self. If I new then what I know now, I would have, but I didn't. Is it unfair, yes, to both of us.

[Karan]

Did not tell my wife for the aforementioned reasons. Ironically she is grateful I did not. She said she would not have married me if I had told her and not marrying me would have been the biggest mistake of her life.

[Jaylyn]

I was dating at the time and had a date with my future wife. I actually told her how nice she looked in red lipstick n I loved it when she wore her heels n panty hose. Jump forward now to just after the wedding. She was dressing and I ask her to wear that red lipstick and get her nails long and painted red as I loved it when she looked hot and sexy like that. Then jump a few more years and remember all the while I was buying her the sexiest outfits and many hose and heels n all the makeup she wanted and more. She finally asked me what I had with all the dressing her up and her wearing tons of makeup. I pretty much told her I just love it and told about everything I had tried in the past while having to hide everything in a special spot in the barn. I also told her about how my mom dressed me because she always wanted her first born to be a girl. I was surprised when my wife said well here let me help fix you up. She did and when were both dressed somewhat and wearing that deep red plum looking lipstick we started kissing each other all over and then applying more. That lead to some very hot sex. She loved it and I especially did. Roll forward to now I have my own makeup, dresses, heels, and all the hose and garters I could ever want. All she ask was that I please keep our secret from the kids. I have honored her wish. We still have some fun times with Jaylyn and I love her more than ever. She even buys Jaylyn things now that she thinks Jaylyn would look nice in. I have been very lucky as I believe most CDs mess up when they keep it from the one they love. Most that do usually will get caught with their panties on one day and then it's a lot harder to explain. I disclosed way before 1985.

[Gillian Gigs]

Like so many others, I honestly thought that I would out grow CDing as it was only a phase I was going through. I guess I am still going through it! Fortunately my wife was not upset about it, she sees it my my little fetish thing which is harming no one. We have mutually decided on boundries and I have no problem living within them. In fact the boundries have grown in my favor over the years. Who really knows how another person will react to a particular behavior. She asked all of the typical questions that a wife of a CDer asks, once the reality of the answered questions sunk in, things loosened up and things are still improving in my favor. I never "pushed" my luck, just let things take there course.

[Eryn]

25 years ago when I married I had no idea of what crossdressing was, let alone knowing that I *was* one.

That seems silly, but the facts that I "knew" were that men who wore women's clothes were drag queens, men who changed their gender were Christine Jorgenson and Renee Richards, and all I had was an strong interest in feminine things that was easily explainable as simply an extension of my interest in women. I expected that would resolve itself after I was happily married. I certainly wasn't going to discuss the topic with the love of my life!

It took 20 years of marriage for me to figure out (with the help of the Internet) that being TG was part of the spectrum of human experience. Luckily, my wife is a very smart lady who did her own research and decided to help me, not try to "cure" me.

[MaryGennaeAngelina]

I must say I don't get what the big deal is. You are talking about a piece of cloth and a few 'coutrements. there wont be demons coming up out of the ground, the sun wont explode. I guess I see it that way because from my perspective I see this body as a hotel and it may have whoever in it I decide. I may decide it is occupied by one of the people in one of my scripts. Mostly it is occupied by a goth, then on another day the goth puts on high heels or high boots and goes down to take a walk in the park. I really just don't understand people who are so straight laced that they must utterly conform to N O R M A L and that cant be compromised. I like to be me, and I make no real secret of it to others. Dress or overcoat, it all works. Divorcing someone because one day it is blue jeans and mens shirt then the next day it is a dress and heels makes no sense to me. Just my view.

[ShelbyDawn]

I didn't tell my ex because it had been almost 30 years since I last dressed and even then, I pretty much just stuck to wearing panties.
I honestly never thought about it so there was nothing to tell.

I will admit to trying on my sisters' dresses and stuff when I was a teenager and enjoying it very much.
For some reason, when I left for college, the desire just went away.
It wasn't until my wife started getting abusive that I began to retreat into dressing.
And the death spiral commenced... More abuse, more dressing... more dressing, more abuse...

[Jilmac]

I disclosed to wives no. 1 and 2 early on, before there was any talk of marriage, #1 in 1969, #2 in 1971. Both were informed, both disapproved. Back then crossdressing was a social taboo so I remained closeted for too many years. both wives have succumbed to the grim reaper and I am now un-closeted. I still disclose if I meet someone I want to get close to and even though some may not fully understand, I consider it their hang up and I'm relieved of the burden of secrecy.

[Stephanie47]

When I met my future wife (1971) I had not worn women's clothing for several years. I had absolutely no desire for those years. I spent two years in the army and had no thoughts of cross dressing. I had only dabbled in my mother's lingerie drawer and tried on a dress several times. Before I did propose my old escapades ran through my mind, as they had done many times before. I had been confused during my teen years. Was I gay because I wore women's clothing? Frankly, any guy wearing women's clothing back in the 1960's or before was surely a "faggot," a "queer," and other derogatory expressions. I knew I liked girls, but, this cross dressing thing was confusing. I decided cross dressing had been something confined to my youth. My wife and I explored bedroom fetish dressing (long nylon nightgowns and stockings) until my desires grew. Then it became DADT, which has worked out well. My wife did express once that had she known she would not have married me. Of course, that was the girl of the 1960's talking. With years of growing together she realized it was a small part of who I am. Others are not as fortunate.

[Eryn]

I must say I don't get what the big deal is. You are talking about a piece of cloth and a few 'coutrements.

To you, this may be true, but to a GG who has developed a particular view of her husband's masculinity it may be devastating. Being TG is innate to us, but it isn't to our spouses.

From my point of view, I felt driven to dress. Nevertheless, I had deep-seated fears of what might happen if I were found out. That didn't stop me, but it did make me very careful about what I did.

Imagine the similar fears that a wife might have, especially at first when she has little understanding of TG issues. From her point of view the husband is endangering their marriage and livelihood for what seems to her to be trivial reasons. After all, she wears the clothes and knows that there is no magic in them.

[sometimes_miss]

I must say I don't get what the big deal is.

The big deal is, it screws up the dynamics of sexual attraction. Women are naturally turned on by masculine traits, and turned off by feminine ones in men. Turn off the sexual attraction, and your romantic relationship is done, over, and she'll start looking for another male to take your place in that part of her heart.

That's it in a nutshell. I can elaborate, but it takes up a lot of space, so if you want the complete explanation, PM me and I'll send it to you. Or you can just read my bio, link at the bottom of my post.

[Sarasometimes]

Ditto fro m what Katie888 and mecha.. said. I'm in therapy to continue to try and figure things out still and in a DADT (she must know from many small hints incidences). I often run through my mind the idea of telling her and I see no upside for her or me. If I tell her all then she now has to decide, stay or go not a lot of middle ground. If she stays will I need to stop doing what I wont stop doing? Who could she confide in to get support? I read in a Psychology Today magazine the torture a spouse goes through when saddled with a secret about the other. Examples, tax evasion to being bisexual...They become isolated and abetters or they leave and struggle to explain why.
Hindsight is 20/20. Looking back if she would have been told and fully accepted it where would we be today? My career would have been vastly different and less lucrative. My two kids would be enduring all types of stress and bullying if being out was part of the plan...
If she said no to marriage who knows?