Hi all,
I figured it has been some time since I posted a "musing of my mind" and as I am nursing a few injuries and Isha time is not really an option right now I thought . . . "Why not post?" I will try to keep it short (yeah I know . . . "sure Isha" )
Anyway, I noticed a theme in a few threads about "curing, stopping, halting, taking a hiatus and whatnot" from CDing. A response to a thread started by Laura (If a cure existed would you still be you?) about exercising willpower as a potential key to stopping got me thinking . . . Can we truly just quit if we exercise willpower? I am interested in all takes on this (and of course will put my own spin on it) but I would ask that we keep things to responding to the question "Can we quit" and not spiral into "should CDing be cured" "would you want to cured" . . . Thanks.
While I agree in theory that "will power" is a strong enforcer when it comes to some things in our lives and has been very helpful for curbing a variety of addictions . . . I truly believe that CDing is not an addiction in the true sense of the word. Yes while some CDers can get addicted to buying shoes, dresses, undies, etc., these tend to be secondary to the need to dress not the cause of dressing. So, while there is no real body of literature which lends itself to "why we CD" most tend to agree it sits on the spectrum between nature (biological) and nurture (social) most likely more biological than social. For myself I know that Isha (i.e., dressing) is integral to my personality as much as my boy side is. I am not addicted to her, she is just there.
There are lots of examples of will power being used to help to curb addictions like alcoholism, gambling, drugs (i.e., success). However, contrarily CDing has a high recidivism (not the best choice of words . . . sorry) rate. All you have to do is read this forum to identify the countless attempts at "purge" only to return to CDing. Yes it is possible that some folks have had success and have gone on with their lives but from what I have read both on this forum and scholarly journals . . . it is very rare. So while addictive personalities can be controlled by exercising "will power" in addition to support groups, counselling, etc. . . . not so much for CDing.
IMO CDing is not an addiction akin to others as most of the others lead to some sort of "self destructive" behavior. On the other hand from what I have read on this forum, for many CDers dressing (in whatever form), tends to have the opposite effect in that it calms them, gives them clarity and makes them feel happy. In my own personal circumstances, I suppressed my desires for 30 plus years until Isha made her appearance. However during that time I slowly slid from happy go lucky guy to angry hostile douche bag husband and finally spiralling into a very dark depressive place (truly self-destructive) . It wasn't until I embraced Isha that I managed to pull myself back. Yes, you can argue that some CDers may spend way too much money on clothes, potentially lose friends, family and livelihood due to CDing but is that truly "self-destructive" in the manner a gambling addiction is or drug use is self-destructive? The end result is that the CDer (for the most part) is at peace with her/himself (once they accept themselves) and is able to cope better in the world.
So while it might be easy to say " take off that dress, put on pants and just do it" I think we are dealing with something different than an addiction (for most). So IMHO I don't think we can truly quit. We might be able to take a hiatus for various periods to time but we will always return to CDing in some form or another.
So what are your thoughts on this?
Hugs
Isha