Quote Originally Posted by ReineD View Post
Leslie, I understand the quandary you find yourself in. In a nutshell, you've come to accept yourself over the years due to all the reasons you mentioned, and you no longer wish to behave at home as if the CDing is a shameful part of who you are. You also would like your wife to educate herself sufficiently to at least acknowledge that Leslie is an integral part of who you are. The ideal would be if she could enjoy Leslie as well, like your other GG acquaintances.

It doesn't look as if this is going to happen, and I agree this is difficult for you, especially when you read stories of other CDers here who have accepting wives. Anyone in your shoes would feel frustrated.

I also gather that you have some freedom of movement, meaning that you do not need to hide any of your things, you are free to purchase what you will, and you also go out dressed frequently without having to hide this from your wife?

So now you must choose a course of action. You can either accept that your wife will not change and no matter how much you would like her to enjoy Leslie, respect the fact that she doesn't and stop faulting her. You can still enjoy yourself when you go out and also enjoy the friendships you are making.

Or, you can decide how important it is for you to have a partner who is involved. If you find your marital situation unbearable as is, then you should consider speaking to your wife candidly about the seriousness of the situation and be prepared to make some changes (separation) if she feels equally strong about not being involved. This would be the honest thing to do, for both of you.

The worst thing to do is to build up bitterness over her non-acceptance, and assign blame on either yourself or her. Eventually the pent-up resentments will grow (if they haven't already), and your marriage will become distant if not entirely disconnected.

Do you still love your wife?
Wow! - or is that.. Ouch?!, Reine!

I think that you have managed to encapsulate my situation perfectly, and in a far more succinct manner than I was able to do so far. Much food for thought here, and I am really going to have to mull over some of the points you have raised in your reply.

Yes, I do love my wife very much despite all my grumbling here, and deep down inside she loves me equally - if not more. When things are going well, she freely tells me this, affirms that she has never met anyone quite like me (no sh*t! ), and that she could not imagine a life without me. We have a very good marriage otherwise, have much in common, and have raised two lovely and accomplished children together. And FWIW, she was a virgin when we got married, so I am her "one and only" in more ways than one. It's just that d*mn, pesky crossdressing thing that she can't get past - especially since it is something that she cannot "control", unlike so many other aspects of her life.

It's not that I want my wife to embrace my crossdressing or evenly participate in it. Given her views on the subject, that would probably be a huge "downer" anyway, even if she could somehow force herself to meet "Leslie" or even see a picture of her.

I guess that at the end of the day, I am just looking for some validation that this is an integral part of me, that it will never go away, and that we should be able to openly talk about it without it always becoming an "issue". Just to hear her say something along the lines of: "You seem very stressed today. Maybe you need some "Leslie" time. How about I go out for the afternoon and you could dress up for a while?" That would be music to my ears, and an acknowledgement that my needs in that regard are both legitimate and "okay". I certainly go out of my way to accommodate most of her needs and idiosyncrasies without giving it too much thought.

Yes, Reine, you are right - I have managed to carve out a great deal of freedom to do what I want (and need) within the confines of our particular DADT arrangement. But I have also had to fight and claw for every one of those concessions in a war of attrition that sometimes resembled the Battle of Stalingrad, where gains were measured in inches, and the fighting was block-by-block, street-by-street, house-by-house, and ultimately room-by-room...

Yes, I may have come out ahead in the process, but at what cost, and why did it have to be such a struggle?