Came Out (again)

[Tracy Irving]

Excellent positive outcome Ilene. It is always nice to read about personal politics having far less to do with our crossdressing than we think.

[Beverley Sims]

Ilene, I picture you crossing a creek choosing which stone to jump on next......

Well that's one creek crossed. :-)

[sometimes_miss]

also were confronted by cross dressers who were the supposedly least likely to be cross dressers, people would be more understanding.

It generally doesn't work out that way; people have strong beliefs about what is appropriate and what is not, and when a person who's distinctly male comes out as CD TG or TS, instead of understanding, they simply feel angry that they were fooled about that person. Caitlyn Jenner being the best example. Rather than accept that TS is a naturally occuring phenomenon, most people just thought he was mentally ill. Sure, a few will start to try to understand, but most just want their world to reflect how they currently feel, and not have to make any adjustments to it.

[bridget thronton]

Good story - great brother

[Rogina B]

It generally doesn't work out that way; people have strong beliefs about what is appropriate and what is not, and when a person who's distinctly male comes out as CD TG or TS, instead of understanding, they simply feel angry that they were fooled about that person. Sure, a few will start to try to understand, but most just want their world to reflect how they currently feel, and not have to make any adjustments to it.

EXACTLY ! And this is one of the reasons that I believe the narrative must be thought out before a transperson shares. Some shares are tougher than others and some explanations need to be more complete than others. Never flinching,nor backing down[aka "CONFIDENCE"] plays a big part. I believe that labels become important because a "crossdresser" is sometimes thought of as "recreational in need " where "transgender" is thought often as "serious gender issues" that the person is handling. Showing that you are the same person,in different packaging, sometimes works for the difficult cases.They will never give your situation much thought anyway,so just change the image in their heads,and move on.

[alwayshave]

Ilene, what a wonderful story. You have some guts.

[ginapoodle]

IleneD,

Excellent...well done. I had a similar supportive experience from my youngest daughter. Not so much from oldest daughter coming out last fall.

[Teresa]

Rogina,
Ilene is only on the first chapter with her brother, I doubt he is going to take in a bunch of labels at the moment , all he knows is his big brother is more than that he suddenly become a partial sister . He may leave it at that and not want to know more but if he does Ilene can move on with more detail in the next chapter .

[IleneD]

I'm on the beach right now and kind of laying low and won't spend a lot of time on the forum.
Just wanted to pop in and thank everyone for the comments and show of support; generally quite supportive and affirmative. Bless you, girls. There are some comments that are so interesting they deserve a thought out response. Give me time.

Thank you all. Yes, another bit of the load is off my back.

[Kandi Robbins]

Please forgive this but there is no other way to say it: that took real balls!

While I am pretty much fearless about where I go and what I do (and parenthetically I have no brother, which is a truly unique relationship), that could not have been easy especially given your brother's preconceived notions about TG people.

Thank you for your service and I mean that both as a veteran and a member of our little community!

I salute you!