From a GG's perspective

[~Joanne~]

All too often the responses are so quick to diagnose the CDer as on a one way train to transitioning, that it is an ever growing monster from which no one can escape. This would scare the hell out of me if I had come here with no knowledge trying to decide if I can handle it.

I agree with 100% on this statement and it does happen an awful lot here. When I first told my SO how far down the rabbit hole this goes (because she sorta knew but didn't which is a long story), I asked her that she came to me if she had questions and I would do my best to answer them as honestly as possible.

I did not tell her she couldn't come here and do some reading but I explained that if she did, she would find a whole bunch of different scenarios, with each sister being different and her needs also being just as different. I didn't want her to think because of all the transitioning talk that I was eventually going to go that route myself but for an SO to just come here on her own to research this CDing? she surely will walk away with the wrong ideas.

Just today I read posts complaining about limits, begging for acceptance, talking about how you cannot ever escape dressing and it will always spiral and the world doesn't understand and wives are unfair and and and

I also agree with the some of this. If your SO isn't accepting of this, sadly, she probably never will be. Sure you can be in a DADT relationship but I always sort of saw that as continuing the lie.

As for limits, I have always had a problem with this. When two people enter into a marriage or relationship, it's suppose to be like a partnership. The good, the bad, and the ugly.....together. Not one lording over the other. When that happens there is a huge lack of respect happening there that needs to be communicated.

Now the part I disagree with is the "you cannot ever escape dressing", this is a very valid statement because it is true. You can't. You may be able to put it away, purge, and everything else to bury it but it will always come back to the surface no matter how hard you try to suppress it, and suppressing it is very unhealthy. Bottling things up is never a good thing, you become an unbearable time bomb....and that is never good for any relationship.

yet you are either completely intolerant of the feelings of your SO that is staying by your side but insisting on DADT, limits or boundaries, SERIOUSLY?

For me, and I speak for myself here, I would never let my SO treat me like a child. ever. I think I find the "insisting" part of this statement disturbing. You could sit like two grown people and talk about a compromise and if you both agree with it then fine but no one should ever go through their lives being lead by anyone else or being told what they can or can not do when the thing being done harms absolutely no one. If it is harmful that's another story but CDing isn't.

How would you feel if Your husband put limits or boundaries on you? I promise you wouldn't like it. We talk about women crossdressing all the time and how no one says a word about it.What if he did? What if he said "oh hell no you can't get that shirt from the men's section, would you anyways? My SO buys shirts for herself all the time in the men's section, she never asks permission to do so, why should I?

I see the vast majority talk about how dressing makes you FEEL, yet you selfishly want to invalidate the feelings of an SO, child, friend, parent or other family?!?
Yeah a perfect world no one would care or have any feeling whatsoever about what you wear, but that ain't the world we live in, so most likely your SO or whoever else is going to have an opinion and feelings about it, so deal with it. You don't get to decide how people feel, just like they don't get to decide what you prefer to wear.

I won't lie, this statement lost me a bit. There is a double standard in there. So your saying that our feelings don't matter but we should respect what others are feeling as if their feelings are more important than ours? We can't decide how they feel but they can decide how we feel? come on now....Your opening statement was SO powerful then you get to this paragraph and it becomes a complete mess.

If you want someone to respect your choice of clothing you also have to respect their comfort level! I mean seriously, I prefer to not wear clothes at home, but my 4 teenagers feel more comfortable when I do, so I do! It isn't that they don't accept that I like being naked, it just makes them uncomfortable! I could seriously go on and on about this but I think you get my point.

Actually no, it's like comparing apples and oranges. We are still clothed regardless of the clothing we chose to wear, we aren't running around naked. Matter of fact, I wear more when I "dress" than when I am in my everyday attire.

The whole comfort level stems from a bunch of ideas from those who think they are better than us and have instilled the idea of what is right or wrong throughout our whole lives, which we should just accept and never question.

If you truly love your SO and respect her, give her the option to accept you, do not force her to live a lie, it is selfish and just wrong. If you think she wouldn't accept you or it would end the relationship, well, newsflash, it shouldn't be. What I mean is, if she doesn't love and respect you enough to accept you, why are you there?!?! I get it, you love her, but really, honestly, are either of you truly living a life of love if is full of lies? Imagine for just one minute how she would feel if tomorrow you were released from your mortal coil, what would that mean to her. Yeah yeah I hear you, but my hidden stash has a note explaining everything. She will be fine. Soooooo if you think she will be fine, TELL HER! I mean even the most accepting person in the world would have questions after finding that note but you are denying her the ability to ask ANYTHING, yet she will absolutely question EVERYTHING! If my SO hid it from me and I found a note and stash of female clothing I would wonder had I lived and loves a lie? Did he really love me? Was he gay? Why didn't he tell me? Did he think so little of me? The list of questions goes on and on

Stand up and be judged. That's how I read this.

This isn't a cakewalk for us. We have lived with this since a young age, it goes back to being fed what is right or wrong, we have been fed that this is wrong behavior. That it is abnormal behavior. If it was you, because there are FTM CD's, would you, after having held this secret for X number of years, be willing to just tell everyone you ever dated about it? no, you wouldn't. I promise you wouldn't. What make you seem to think that it should be "that easy" for us?

We see all kinds of people, from all kinds of lives, get crapped on just for being who they are, without the CDing, because we are living by other people standards our whole life, which was planted there from birth. So we should just tell everyone right away just to suffer the same fate? Sorry, we haven't been wired that way. It really is all a mind game on us and i think we may realize that but it doesn't make a lot of the choices we make in life any easier.

Now, I am assuming here that you are talking about a marriage and not just dating. Anyone who is dating and brings this forth is a fool. I am not saying that if you have been with someone say like six months, you shouldn't bring it up but not in the first month that's for sure.

If after you have been with whoever for awhile, you should have a good feel for what kind of person they are, If she is the vindictive type, then you should end the relationship. If she likes to gossip alot for no reason, you should probably do the same because the next person she is going to stab in the back is you. But if all is well, and if you are ready, then by all means you should.

I STRONGLY feel that you should never walk that aisle without having the talk the minute you want to propose to who ever. If you want to spend the rest of your days with this person, you have to go into it honestly. Going into a bond dishonestly is never a good thing but dating? I just don't see it.

In the end you talk alot about giving Her/Him a choice, I ask you this, who denied us our choice as to whether or not we wanted to carry this burden our whole life?

I am not saying your wrong juliette on a lot of the points you make but I do feel that some of this is one sided.