What Caused You to Become a Crossdresser?

[Laura J]

Dunno

I could blame it on the fact that I have never had a dad. I guess i have always just though women were better than men...

[nikinylons]

I can totally relate Ellen.

Reine said: "This is interesting. Dressing like a girl gave you permission to experience feelings that you did not think was OK for men to feel. Maybe this is what is different about some men who end up CDing .. they have a rather rigid, unforgiving view of what men must feel, so they construct a different persona in order to feel the full breadth of human emotion? I think it's OK for men to not feel macho. "

Once again your insight express how I feel about being dressed. I was raised on a farm and worked outside with my father from a very early age. He did a good job to teaching me how to be a man. However I was always jealous of my sisters that got to help Mom in the house and wear such pretty things. As an adult I found that "being Macho" had its rewards but can be very tiring. When I am dressed I give myself permission to relax and not be manly. I can express emotions and feel very comfortable performing what I was taught to be very feminine roles. It gives me a break from my standard role in life. Over the years I have been able to incorporate these new emotions into my male persona and my wife feels that this has made me a more complete person.

[Lacelover]

It must have been in my girl jeans, Oops, I mean genes.

Lacelover

[Alice_2014_B]

I guess for me it was high heels. I vaguely remember my Grand-Mother and Mother looking into tap-shoes for (cannot recall my age at the time). For some reason they had a pair of girl's tap-shoes too. I do not remember if I tried them on or they just used them to find me a size or something. But that is the earliest I remember of that.
The knots in the stomach, as I have read in at least one of the posts here; I recall those very much.

[Simone_40]

DNA?

[Leanna Jean]

I started the awareness of how pretty females were and the clothes they wore at around 3 years of age. I found my grandmothers' long dresses so colorful and fun to wear. I would then put flowers in hair and I felt so pretty. Then there was my mother she was such a beautiful woman who would tease me as she dressed. She would put lipstick on my lips. She then dressed me as a little girl when she made dresses for my cousins, my first and only modeling job to date! She painted my nails, made up my face, put perfume and even clip earrings. So with that as I got older I would try on my mother's clothes, shoes, jewelry and makeup. I remember an episode of Gilligan's Island where Gilligan was dressed as a convincing girl I loved it. I also remember the episodes of General Hospital that had a crossdresser as an everyday character. i then had a series of girlfriends who convinced me to dress, yeah I tried to resist. But starting in the 90's things became different and dressing wasn't so out of place and my urges got stronger which takes me to today!

[Zoe B]

I don't know if there is a single event moment, I have always have jobs that seemed to be labelled 'female' careers (like nursing), not that I ever saw them that way. I always found shopping to be more fun in the female section - new styles for each season and so on, unlike the men's section of no change clothes.

Unless it was the decades I grew up in 70's/80's, but in honesty nothing has made me crossdress I just enjoy it.

[kimberlybates]

I believe it was the curiosity over the long blue silk nightgown that I found sitting in the laundry basket when I was home alone. It belonged to my Aunt. Once I had tried it on I was hooked. I loved the feel against my skin. After that experience I began to dress in women's lingerie every chance I found.

[MelanieAnne]

My mother never missed an opportunity to let us know she wanted girls.

[Chiana]

In my case, there was no defining moment. No outside influence. No weak father. No dominating mother. My Mother didn't want me to be a girl. No older sister or neighborhood girls who forced me to dress up. Etc. From my earliest age, I was interested in feminine things. In the words of Lady Gaga. "I was born this way." I never have looked for a reason to justify my crossdressing. It is just me.

[sylviatv]

i cant explaine. it just happend and feels good. Mabye it is our dna

[LANKO]

I can't really pinpoint one single moment. The thoughts that do come to my head.. I don't know if they actually swayed me, might be just memories and braintricks.

1. When I was young, I remember seeing my Mom's Victoria Secret's catalog.. this was right before puberty.. and maybe the first time I got to really see "underneath the clothes" clothes for women. Bras, panties, nighties.. they were so different from what I wore. They were also expensive as hell. My wifebeater shirts and undies came in packs of 3-6 for a fraction.. this stuff must be gold! When you are little and have no income (or any sense of money in general), you put certain things on pedestals without realizing it.

2. From puberty I went through the "usual" male phase, trying to get ahold of any porn I could. Acquiring porn throughout high school was very exciting compared to now.. I guess it's because it's like alcohol and cigarettes.. getting away with it is more exciting and thrilling when it's not legal for you.

I remember finding a nearby corner store that had a rack of mags and VHS tapes.. I would go in and be scared out of my life to look at what they had. Picking up something and waiting to pay for it at the counter seemed to take FOREVER. Right now when I'm buying heels and makeup.. I get a very similar rush as somewhere in my brain I'm thinking "this isn't for your personal use"---someone's going to call me out on it. But that store never care I wasn't 18 yet.. and what a rush when I came out with my purchase.

3. I've had several girlfriends in my youth.. but my first one in college really, really knew how to dress. She was Japanese (though born here), and really was into fashion---heels, makeup, matching bra/panties, brand name bags. Amidst all the sweatpants and hoodies, she really stood out and I appreciated her efforts when we went out. She was also the first girl that in our sex life, would keep some of her clothes on (eg heels on, jeans down to the ankles, bra still on). My previous 2 girlfriends would always strip all the way for the act, so this was new and I loved it.

Those are the 3 off the top of my head. I don't know. Maybe they have nothing to do with what I'm doing right now with my feminine dressing. Maybe they do. Maybe it's something that I can't even remember. If I had to put money on it though, probably something to do with the above.

[Kristina_nolagirl]

God. And so glad he (or she) did!

[biannne]

I don't think I can put finger on one event or reason. But as baby, my grandmom used to dress me as girl .... never knew why and I never asked even when I grew up. I have high pitched voice and kids called me girly.
Even as kids, I loved older women and their clothes and when I was 11 or 12 I was pair of my moms old panties.
But it wasn't till I was 30 that I started dressing up.
I am not sure what reason, I have always felt like I was trapped inside man's body.


Ana

[Tinkerbell-GG]

This is a fascinating thread. I don't actually see that many 'I was born this way' or 'it's genetic' answers, even if this is the accepted theory here. What I do see are men who felt curious about girl things and stepped over a boundary most other men don't. That's it. Nothing extraordinary or even that unusual. Your stars aligned on that day, for whatever reason, and the rest is history.

Yep, fascinating.

[Jenniferathome]

....stepped over a boundary most other men don't. That's it. Nothing extraordinary or even that unusual. ...

But WHY did we step over the line?

Psst, its genetics ;-)

but sadly, science will never prove me right.

[Ugly Michele]

My sisters dressed me as their sister, would take me shopping with them among other things.

[Wildaboutheels]

It's well established FACT that men are easily turned on by looking at FEmales or female body parts. Which in many cases leads to the promised land where all kinds of CHEMICALS are released by the brain. This is all completely autonomous. Men putting on/wearing SPECIFIC clothing items [that females usually wear to look their "best"] enable this.

It's simply E V O L U T I O N at work and endless obfuscation or denial is not gong to change it for 99% of the CDers on the planet.

And no one but the most most extremely UNsharp person would claim to know just how many men actually Crossdress.

Refusing to accept that any amount of CDing that our brains associate with Os will quickly become addictive is a sure fire recipe for never being able to shed the shame and guilt.

[Nadya]

I don't know if there really is specific event that caused my desire to like to dress like a woman. I've always had good friends that were female. My guy friends were never the macho type because that's not really who I was and that tended annoy me. I always did things that were not typical little boy things with my mother (e.g. needle point, english horseback riding, collecting my little ponies, etc.) but I don't know if it was a product of my own interests or my environment. Tough to say for sure.

[Joyce S.]

You have all probably heard the phrase "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery"? To me, this is it. I admire and respect women and while I do not wish to be one I do like to dress like them. Heels, I love heels, oh and fluffy dresses....


JS
"God put us here to learn how to love one another"

[Skylarlynn40]

I really don't know why I started crossdressing. I know that I was drawn to the pretty clothes and how they felt against my skin. I specifically remember a couple situations where I initially dabbled in dressing. One time I saw my mother's bra laying on the ground and looked around to make sure no one was looking before I held it up to my chest. Another major moment for me was when my mother had bought my sister a pink one piece swimming suit. I saw it hanging in the bathroom one day and had to try it on. I have been dressing off and on ever since.

[Kylee-Blackstad]

To be honest, unlike my partner, I never had any inclinations to cross-dress earlier in my life at all.. I think the first time I sort of did and felt rather comfy when I threw on the top of my friends nurse costume over my shirt as a joke. I strangely liked wearing it. That was I think when I was 16. When I started college in my early twenties, having watched my friend cross-dress for a sociology project, he asked me how I'd feel about doing what he did. It never phased me that I couldn't do it, or wouldn't do it. I suppose me being a pretty boy with a taste for some fashion and not really caring if I was hyper masculine or not factored into it now that I think about it.

When I accepted my bisexuality a number of a years ago, it really opened up a lot of doors to me and in a way gave me license to do things I never would have fathomed being a straight dude. I now had experiences and relationships they wouldn't have had at all. Then two months back that sort of comfy feeling of wearing that nurse costume sort of came back looking at my partner's clothes. So then I did an "earth princess" sort of "drag" outfit for a party. It was way too much fun sashaying and feeling hot. My partner notices that more feminine leanings come out of me that don't normally show, and it's rather automatic and unconscious to me.

So in looking at things, there maybe some sort of genetic disposition, but it was really my cultural experiences and new sexual identity that lead me to fully come into being as a cross dresser. There's also a somewhat good chunk of it that's political to me, which is kind of way I don't really care if I happen to pass or not. Guess you could say that's why I chose a rather androgynous avatar. I actually feel more validation when a guy checks me out and then realizes I'm not a girl and sort of looks surprised. Every time that happens I think in my head:

"Hope you enjoyed my cute little butt!"

[typhoidmary]

I think for me it was just something innate. I was influenced by people like Brian Molko and Davey Havok in my teens and got into makeup... slowly got to the point where I am now, it's just kind of built and built and I don't know if it will stop. by this point I'm not even very comfortable being referred to as a man even though technically people are right to do so.

[Jenny Gurl]

But WHY did we step over the line?

Psst, its genetics ;-)

but sadly, science will never prove me right.

Exactly. I believe several replying to the post were thinking back to the first time they acted on their desire to dress feminine , not actually stating why they felt the need to dress in the first place. Many break the question down to "Nature" vs "Nurture". In other words did mother nature make you that way, or did something in your nurturing cause you do become a crossdresser. For the record, I was born this way with no influence whatsoever that would cause me to be a crossdresser. I was raised in an very conservative christian home where I would have every reason to not want to be a crossdresser. No one in the family would accept it, our religion forbid it, and if I were to have outed myself as a child for being a CD, it would have been shunned by my family, probably beat daily at school, and been driven to suicide in a short time. I was not dressed by anyone or in any way encouraged to be feminine. Many will quote the first time they remember either dressing, putting on makeup, etc. but the truth is, if any of these events happened to a person who was not born a CD, they would have reacted completely different and not have become a CD in the future. Kind of like a diabetic having too much sugar the fist time and saying that amount of sugar caused their diabetes. It may have caused that particular person to become diabetic, but only because of a predisposition to be effected by it.

I was born with feminine traits, and that is all there is to it. I did learn at an early age that as I sometimes would reveal a bit of feminine traits I was quickly ridiculed and I quickly learned that although this was my true inner person, I would have to hide it or face negative retribution by all I knew.

Summary: Genetics, born this way, hopefully science will verify this and be able to identify TG genes in the future so the TG person can best deal with it knowing who they are. It would also force the larger population of people who either don't understand it, or have some other religious or moral reason to ridicule and hate a person for simply being born with traits they have no control over.

[ReineD]

I did learn at an early age that as I sometimes would reveal a bit of feminine traits I was quickly ridiculed and I quickly learned that although this was my true inner person, I would have to hide it or face negative retribution by all I knew.

What feminine traits did you feel? I know you had to hide them, so they weren't physical traits. Was it that you cried easily as a boy and you had to learn to toughen up? My younger brother was that way. Or were they desires, like wanting to play with girl toys, wanting to wear what girls wore, in short wanting to be a girl?