Zooey, thanks for your reply.

Firstly, and it is important that I say this - I no longer regard myself as cd. I just want to be clear about that.

One thing I could never wrap my own head around was the constant referral to myself (by others) using a female pronoun. (Yet here I am with a female name, so I'm guilty of being hypocritical in that respect, and I'm also guilty of referring to other cd's here using female pronouns, which again could be seen as being hypocritical). I acknowledge that, but it is something that I was never comfortable with - either towards other cd's, or other cd's towards myself. I explored myself, what I felt I was, who I felt I was, etc etc. And it's been a long journey for me (lasting 40 years ultimately). I'm now in a place whereby I've realised that this isn't for me at all. And that makes me so different from you. The amount of time it took me to find myself, you perhaps dedicated to finding yourself - what is right for you. I admire you, the courage you have displayed, risking and experiencing loss in order to finally feel at one with yourself. And even though we've both reached a conclusion that is completely at odds with one another, I can't help but feel that a kindred spirit can come out of that - a struggle and need to find oneself and be happy. Even if the outcome is different, maybe the experience in getting to such a point can at least be empathatic. That is, even though we are different, we can still relate.

During my time finding myself, I came out as gay. I was in a civil partnership with a man who accepted my crossdressing. I lost friends and family after I came out, not only as a gay man, but also as a crossdresser. Interestingly enough, more people did accept me as being gay than they accepted me as a crossdresser. I lost more friends because of the latter than I did the former. My relationship with my husband (he was my husband, even though it was a time when such a term wasn't legally recognised (i.e. before gay marriage was legalised) ended. I'm now single. It has been a struggle, but I'm now happy. And yet no one in my life believes me. Once out as a crossdresser, a crossdresser one will always be. I will take that to my grave.

I don't project any hierarchy. I can only say that for myself. I have strong views that are at odds with many here. I have expressed some of these views and been ridiculed for them. I have had several heated exchanges with the mods on this site. I don't like any of them to be perfectly blunt. I don't belong here. Yet I nevertheless feel a kindred spirit with everyone who I have ever communicated with here. Because I can relate to them, even if only to a certain extent. For me, I don't have to relate to someone fully. simply relating to them in regards to a snippet of their life, a snippet of their experience, is enough for me to empathise with them. To understand their own struggles. Their own issues. And I thank them for that, because reading and hearing about the issues of others has helped me find myself.

You are not on the same level. No one ever actually is. An identification doesn't work that way. For what you have had to deal with isn't the same as what someone else has had to deal with. Equally what one crossdresser has had to deal with isn't the same as another. One will find acceptance in their family, the other will not. Yet both are crossdressers. What one transgender person has lost, another transgender person will not have done. Yet both are transgender. It is simply too simplistic to label individuals in such a way. Teresa has, by all accounts, had far more harsh struggles than other crossdressers, yet you are still bracketing Teresa in with all other crossdressers. It simply doesn't work that way. We all know this. Yet we all do that very thing.