Will someone you know recognize you while en femme?

[Ressie]

They might if they come face to face with me. And suddenly being face to face with someone you know can happen. As beautiful as I am, some of my men friends might approach and hit on me!

[Rollermiss]

My guess is that I am at about a 10-20% chance I would be recognized, especially with the people I work with. Hence Why I don't go out here in town. My partner did, in about 2 seconds, he just raised his head looked at me then put his head down, moaned and went back to sleep. It may have been I came from our bedroom not outside but who knows.

Kelsey

[BrendaPDX]

If I took time with my makeup, and hadn't dressed in a hurry, no. If I opened my mouth, they would know something was up, but probably still wouldn't recognize me. Thanks for the fun question. Brenda

[StephanieCLT]

I'd like to think no, as my biggest fear is someone putting two and two together and being outed, whether it's via a picture or a real life interaction. The one affirmation I got was recently. I was on a plane, in male mode, sitting next to a nice woman about my age. For some reason, as we were talking, I got the urge to show her some of my pictures on my laptop. I asked her if she recognized the girl in the pictures, and her response was that she looked familiar, but couldn't place her. I just smiled and said, "look me in the face." So, that was good!

[Mickitv]

Without a professional makeover I believe someone would recognize me. I try to stay true to who I am when I do makeup.

[Susan Smokes]

For me I would say 50/50. My image as a crossdresser is on social media, so I think at some point I will be discovered.

[Karmen]

That's the only reason why I don't use any social media or upload my photos in female clothes to the internet. I had a FB account at start, but soon discovered that FB started suggesting to my friends and family this female account as potential friend, even I used separate web browsers for different accounts. After that, I disabled my female account.

[Alenko]

I don't know. But when I show a before and after picture, people freak out.

[IleneD]

I just had one of these.....YESTERDAY. I posted about it in another thread but I'll reprise it for this string.

I went to get my nails done; mani/pedi. I deliberately went to a new shop that was a distance not too close to my residence. I even scouted it out a couple hours before I showed up en femme. I thought all was cool.
A man stepped out of the back and sat down at a workstation at the far end of the shop. He sat down and began styling a set of acrylic nails on another customer. The man was also my next door neighbor. I was so startled that I spoke his name out loud to myself. He heard me make a sound and looked my way but never gave much notice to me otherwise.
My neighbor is Vietnamese. Very nice man and we see each other outside, as neighbors do. His English is very poor and it's difficult to hold even a short conversation with him. I figured out from the interactions with the other employees that it was one of his shops.

I was already in-deep on the nails and couldn't walk out of the shop. I finished. As I was sitting in the chair, when Neighbor donned his jacket to leave. As he walked past he stopped and looked at me and said, "Do you know me?". I could tell from his face that he had NOT made me at all (behind the wig and makeup), so I didn't depart my Ilene character and "tell on myself". All I could say was " No, I was just saying hi." He turned, shook his head a little, took one more look and walked out. Nothing else.

I could not believe it. He was maybe 4 ft from me. I know he's seen me face to face many times and heard my voice. I wouldn't be surprised if somehow it all dawned on him later when he reflected upon the encounter. (I'm not too worried about being out-ed to him. Who's he going to tell? He speaks almost no English.) But within the context of a chance meeting and me being entirely en femme, it didn't register with him at all.

[Glenda58]

I was in the mall shopping when my EX girl friend walked by. Was waiting for her to yell out there's that CD. But she just walked by didn't even take a second look. I don't think most would back then but now that I'm older someone might.

[Bianca Fay]

I've still very much in the CD closet & have never been en femme in public. In fact, I'm still working on aquiring complete outfits & only one person in this world knows my secret, but I very much want to step out someday.
If I ever get the courage, I think I'd go to a nearby city other than where I live to avoid being recognized.
The trick would be remembering to 'blend' & resisting the urge to wear a LBD & stilletos during the afternoon.
My hat's off to you ladies who've found the courage to take the plunge.

[Sarah Doepner]

I went to see my therapist since my last post. A lot of good discussion and suggestions, but that's for another post. He has seen me both as Dave and as Sarah and went into some detail telling me how "transformative" (his word) my presentation is and he doubted that family members would recognize me at first. I'm not paying him for false praise, so I hope that was an honest response. I still think I'm easily recognized as not a genetic woman, just maybe not as easily identified with specificity.

[Karen RHT]

I've yet to attain the knowledge and level of skill with makeup that is required to hide my male mug well enough not to be recognized by those who know me. I've been amazed by many of the "boy mode vs girl mode" pics I've seen on this site and others. More power to those of you who have reached that level of success, but one look at my avatar gives one a pretty good idea of how relatively easy it would be for those who know me to recognize me.


Karen

[Taylor186]

I would say that outside of my hometown someone I know would not recognize me even though I do not blend in.

I will add that I was a member of a CD social/support group a few years ago and met a lot of people not knowing where they lived. One Sunday at church, while not paying much attention, I heard a familiar voice at the front microphone during congregation share time. It caught me by surprise so I looked to the speaker and immediately knew that it was someone from my CD group. I had seen this person at church many times but had never heard him talk until that moment.

My conclusion: your voice will out you to an acquaintance more quickly than your look, and, of course, having your wife by your side will out you too.

[nikkiwindsor]

I'll share a little story and you can draw your own conclusions. Many years ago, my daughter, who at the time was in her early teens (and as with almost all adolescents, full of curiosity and questions), stumbled across some pics on our home computer of me en femme. Fortunately, the pictures were not taken inside our home or any other place frequented or would be recognized by my daughter. She asked my wife (her mom) who the woman in the pictures was and my wife worked hard to keep a straight face while explaining that the pics were of someone who was a family friend. You can imagine the scolding (putting it too mildly b/c she was seething) I received from my wife.

[IleneD]

...stumbled across some pics on our home computer of me en femme. ...... You can imagine the scolding (putting it too mildly b/c she was seething) I received from my wife.

While I have shared a story below on how a neighbor failed to make me out, I too have an example of being made by a 6 yr old, quite similar to what happened to you, Nikki. And mine ended with a disastrous break in the budding new CD relationship I had just revealed to The Wife. A bad mistake.

I left a photo (actually 2) of me dressed on The Cloud (to make the long explanation on "how" to be short). I thought I'd truly transferred them all off common photo storage points. And it was about 3 months after I'd Come Out to my wife; so we were still dealing with a very delicate and tenuous approval of being CD.

My daughter, granddaughter and sister-in-law were visiting. We have a feature on our TV that scrolls photo albums from my hard drive or internet. I was upstair showering and not with them when it happened. A photo of me in one of my new dresses and my new wig popped up on the TV.
The ladies and my wife were not gazing upon the TV at the time, but apparently my 6 yr old granddaughter was. When the picture appeared on the 65 in screen she exclaimed out loud "Hey, that's Boppa in a dress!" She knew. Of course it was my first wig and I was new to makeup, and I do have a rather distinct face. But even a 6 yr old could see Me.
Of course The Wife was "blown away" embarrassed and quite angry about it. It was a (bad) turning point in our relationship with regards to dealing with my CD and possible transgender issues. I regret the mistake, that's for certain. Now.... at the core of nearly all our discussions about WHERE we as a couple are going with this CD life there is the implicit requirement for Information Control; for keeping this in the house and only to those with a strong need to know. She has been all about security. I, on the other hand, am all about GOING OUT and being Ilene.
But.... lesson learned. Mistakes are costly.