Difference between transgendered and a crossdresser

[Rianna Humble]

I don't quite understand the difference between someone who is transgendered and someone who crossdressses.

That is a little bit like saying you don't understand the difference between an apple and fruit. An apple is fruit, but not all fruit is an apple.

In a similar way, someone who cross-dresses other than for professional (and perhaps fetish) reasons is transgender - that is they cross the normally accepted gender behaviour. Transsexuals are also transgender because our whole being crosses the normally accepted gender identity and behaviour.

Since you posted in the transsexual forum, I will make a guess that you are trying to work out for your self whether your transgender goes as far as you being transsexual.

I do not consider myself to be part of any gender - I believe there is a gender spectrum and let's say it was like this
Male-----------+------X--F
I would be where the X is and it does shift around from time to time, but it never goes all the to the left.. it goes neutral at most.

If you self-identify as more female than male, then you may have gender dysphoria and some may say that you have Gender Identity Disorder, but the question for me would be what level of distress is caused to you by the disconnect between your natal sex and your gender identity.

I don't have any problem in how i view myself. Like I said, I don't like to think I am part of any gender, but if I had to, it would be female. (And i really think it just depends on my hormones that day.. I don't take hormone replacements.. just our bodies naturally produce estrogen and testosterone)

I am not a doctor, but I don't think that most people's body produces sufficiently marked changes in the balance between testosterone and oestrogen to provoke the kind of shift that you describe. That is not trying to deny what you experience, just suggesting that the cause may be different.

I am 27, and I used to just consider myself a crossdresser years ago, and simply didn't think I was transgendered even though, I really wanted to hvae a female body really badly. and still do.. I just have a lot of areas I need to work out first.

If your dressing was linked to your gender identity then you are definitely transgender. Whether you are transsexual is a separate but equally important question for which only you can provide the answer. I am curious what the "other areas" might be that are more important to you than congruence between your gender identity and your body.

could a lot of crossdressers be transgendered? perhaps just living in denial?

As stated above a lot of cross-dressers are transgender, whether they deny it or not, but I think that your intention was to ask if they could be TS in denial. A small number might be, but there are sufficient numbers of cross-dressers whose primary gender identification will always be male for this not to be true in every case.

To refer briefly to my personal experience as an attempt to answer the question I believe you intended to ask. I was in denial for far too long and when it started to come to a head, I tried to use cross-dressing as a coping mechanism. During that period, I was still trying to delude myself that I could be a man (albeit in a dress). So at that time, I would have classed myself as a cross-dresser but would indeed have been TS in denial since I have been TS from birth.