Crossdressing - a unique perspective.

[Guest wxtracker]

Reading some of the topics in this section and other sites related to this issue, I’ve been inspired to write about this.

Let me start out by saying I think it’s perfectly fine to make generalizations about populations. One generalization I often see made about crossdressers is that, as oppose to those who identify as MTF transsexuals who are actually females born in male bodies, crossdressers are “male at the core” and just have a need to express their feminine side sometimes. If this is true for the majority of the population labeled as “crossdressers”, so be it. But it’s not true for me.

I’ve told my friends things like “I kind of feel half male and half female”, only to contradict myself later with different wording, causing a lot of confusion. I thought more deeply about this recently, so that I can describe my feelings to people in a way that makes more sense. So, here’s the truth.

I don’t remember a time where I really cared about being male. It was never a problem per se – that is - I never felt trapped. I just never made it a point to incorporate my birth gender into my identity. In other words, I never felt that being a guy said anything important about me as a person.

On the contrary, being en femme feels good. I don’t want to say it feels right, because that would imply that being in “guy mode” feels wrong, and that’s not the case for me. But, I do feel that having this female identity is part of who I am, as a person. So, in a way, I guess my gender identity leans towards female.

But here’s the catch. I consider it a BLESSING that I was born with a male body. Why? Well, had I been born a female, everything about my female identity would be taken for granted. There would be nothing to appreciate it for - I would just be like all the other girls. Like really, what girls are not into cute outfits? Having a male body allows me to appreciate my feminine side for what it is – something different and unique about me - in the same way that my love of studying the weather is something unique about me. And I wouldn't give that up for anything in the world.

I hope that this perspective can help others – even those who feel that their body is a mistake. I don’t mean to imply that no one needs to transition. Of course for many people, that is the best solution. But being different in this way is an amazing gift – even if you don’t realize it yet.

[Guest Tamar]

Thankyou Wxtracker for sharing your point of view. I must confess that cd has had me mystified and I appreciate the opportunity to deepen my understanding.

Warm hugs

Tamar.

[Charlize]

Thank you for your post. We are all on different paths. Hopefully we all find what we need for happiness. I don't regret being born as a male either. I lived a decent life. It was the only one i had. The memories i have from that time make up a large part of who i am. I'm also glad to be making new memories and hope to enjoy them as well.

Hugs,

Charlie

[Guest Marie L]

One of the reasons I do not entirely regret being born male is that I might not have been nearly as interested in technology and engineering than if I had been born a girl, something I consider to be one of my core traits. However, being born female would have certainly saved me a lot of trouble. :/

[Guest Jo-88]

good attitude Marie!!! ... in fact I feel the same way. Not to mention the fact that this journey has opened my mind to so many different philosophical ideas and ways of thinking, this reality/experience has made me a better person. Knowing myself as well as I do, and analyzing the environment I was raised in, makes me think that if I was born a girl I probably would have grown into a rather close minded and "simple" woman... now I will be so much more than that!

[Guest carolynn2fem]

Real a beutiful post. I feel very simular

[Guest Penelope]

I don't dislke being a male; in fact, most of the time I am quite content being so. The trouble is that it is not enough. There is a definite female component to my being, who is demanding to make herself manifest. She is becoming more insistent about this as time goes on.

I now have an appointment with a gender therapist. I want to see where I am and where I might be going with this.

Hugs to you all,

Penny

[Guest ~Brenda~]

Hi wxtracker,

I completey understand your perspective because so much of what you are saying, I have said too

Love.

Brenda

[Guest sara ann]

I tend to agree with you; on one hand I also am content with myself as a male most of the time however, there are many times that I feel like If had been born female I would have been happier because I would have been able to present myself as female whenever I felt the desire but could wear jeans and simple clothes and no make-up whenever I wanted. I love those times when I am able to wear feminine clothes and make-up but, there are many times that I can't when I would absolutely love to look and feel feminine!

I am lucky that as a male I can still pass as a female. I put this theory to a test a few years ago. I was able to be totally female for a full 2 weeks and it made me feel wonderful. At the end of 2 weeks I really hated to return to being in male mode. Maybe in the long term as female I would feel differently.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts!

Love

Sara Ann

I also would love to have a relationship with a guy but the opportunity never has never happened.

The other thing that confuses me is that I simply love being treated as woman; don't know if I could ever change that.

[Guest wxtracker]

I love those times when I am able to wear feminine clothes and make-up but, there are many times that I can't when I would absolutely love to look and feel feminine!

I know exactly what this feels like! On the rare occasion that thoughts about wishing I was born female does cross my mind, it's in this exact situation. Thank you.

[Guest Claire-G]

Great post.

I can so relate to that and the following answers

[Guest KatyDesire]

Great post!

I firmly believe that there is a spectrum of gender expression, and we are somewhere in the middle - happy in our male selves, but enjoying the female persona.

This is why I am a strong advocate for making our voice heard in the general public I really believe that it is not impossible to get to the point when it is OK for men to present their female selves, without hiding who they are, just as women can.

I recently did the exercise of looking at on-line clothes, to try to objectively analyze what makes certain clothes "male" and others "female". Apart from the obvious, like skirts (and then not in Scotland!), this not easy. I see that fashion is now allowing men to wear fitted shirts with fine, even floral designs - something that has been regarded as "female" for a number of years. There is even a discussion going on in the fashion pages whether or not men should wear leggings ( most think not). Skinny trousers have been OK recently.

Yesterday in the dressing room at my gym, I saw a number of men who really should have been wearing bras! They had bad droops!

Feminists won this battle in the 60s and 70s, and I think it is do-able. I really would like not to be ashamed to be seen in public as a male wearing traditionally female clothes - just as it is OK for a female to wear overalls and construction boots. Or to go into a shop and not get a sideways glance when I walk into the women's section.

There obviously lots of us in this "middle ground" - we need to support each other as much as possible. Thank you for expressing exactly my own feelings.

Hugs,

Katy

[Guest Roberta-Belinda]

I really wish I had been a girl, I often felt like that in childhood and my teenage years. I dont dislike being mail but in perfect world if everyone I know would accept me as a Woman, I really would consider transition. When i am dressed en femme I really feel like a Woman and I embrace it even though my c.d. sessions can be short on times.

[Guest Wendae]

Well said!

[Guest Sheri-xo]

Wxtracker, you seem very well-adjusted. Good for you.

My track (sorry:) was different. I was very much identified with being male--or rather trying to act male, to be accepted as male. I repressed my female so much, I wasn't even conscious of it. Lots of unhappiness. Only when I gave that up and started cross dressing did I become well-adjusted. I'm not unhappy with my male side, just much prefer my female side.

[Guest LindaKay_LV]

For me it's an either/or situation. When I 'm in my femme mode, or wanting to be in my femme mode, I want to be a woman. That's when I start to have the desire to transition and really want to start HRT. But when I'm back in my full blown man mode and doing all of the "guy" things that I enjoy, I look at my crossdressing and can't understand why in the hell I want to wear womans cloths and makeup. I guess that my two modes are at polar opposites without a lot middle ground in between.

Today it's a tight miniskirt, a HOT red top (size D breast forms!) and red platform pumps. QUICK!!! ----> shoot me up with the hormones!!!! I wanna stay here forever!

Hugs & kisses

Linda Kay

[Guest]

I can change very few words in the beginning post and it does fit me too. I am bi-gendered so I can't escape being both female and male. What I can change and what I am transitioning to, is to embace and present my female side. That thing I was denied for so many years. I love her, he was/is OK too. But just OK. I do feel like a miracle, God does nice work. It is my metamorphosis that is so uncomfortable, sometimes down right painful. I only have to leave a portion of male behind me. The rest I can carry in my heart and my skill set. I have no idea where all this will take me, but I would not have lived my best life, if I had not taken this journey. I only get one life, but I get to live it as both people. Wow! So many in this world can never even approach that! They can't understand that! They may even hate me for that. By the grace of God, here go I. One more minute, or five more decades, it is so worth it! Hug. JodyAnn

[Guest Jan Jane]

From the time over 20 years ago when through my work I started meeting people whose orientations were different than what I was idenitfying with, I've become more and more certain that gender identity as well as sexual expression are coninuims (sp), not off/on switches. I think that we all change and grow and adapt as we mature. I get to be who I feel I am at the moment, not what some observer assigns my identity to be.

Hugs to all...

[Guest Penelope]

From the time over 20 years ago when through my work I started meeting people whose orientations were different than what I was idenitfying with, I've become more and more certain that gender identity as well as sexual expression are coninuims (sp), not off/on switches. I think that we all change and grow and adapt as we mature. I get to be who I feel I am at the moment, not what some observer assigns my identity to be.

Hugs to all...

Jan Jane, I am inclined to agree with you. There is always the danger that we, too, fall into a binary gender trap.

There is no point in escaping from one box only to cram yourself into another pre-defined one.

Hugs,

Penny

[Guest KatyDesire]

Jan Jane, I strongly agree with you. Personally, I do not feel strongly male or strongly female - just somewhere in between, and I would like to be able to express that, amongst others, in the way I dress. I just can't get into my head why it should be a problem if I want to wear heels with otherwise male dress, or a skirt when I feel like it, without having to pretend that I am "all" woman. I'm not - I'm a bit of both, and I like being that!

Also, if I feel like expressing myself as one or other end of the spectrum - maybe on alternate days - I really can't see the issue.

Hugs, (that's female mode! )

Katy

[Guest Nikki R]

Sorry girls I accidentally post my comment on the wrong post , I hope the moderator catches it for me. It's been a while since I've been on , had some other stuff going on. Now that I'm on the correct topic I do agree with a lot of what y'all are saying. I compare it to more a dimmer switch than a on/off switch , it's always there just brighter/stronger at times. For those of us who have Wives or SO that know about CDing this is a hard topic to explain. I've recently started journaling (Jan. 7) , I believe if you are true and honest with yourself in your journal , that you will start seeing patterns of when your need to dress are stronger than other times. I'm starting to see some patterns but I don't think it's been long enough yet to really get a good idea.

Hugs , Nikki R

[Guest wxtracker]

Personally, I do not feel strongly male or strongly female - just somewhere in between, and I would like to be able to express that, amongst others, in the way I dress. I just can't get into my head why it should be a problem if I want to wear heels with otherwise male dress, or a skirt when I feel like it, without having to pretend that I am "all" woman. I'm not - I'm a bit of both, and I like being that!

Very interesting Katy - and true. Identifying somewhere between male and female doesn't mean the same thing for everyone. When I'm in girl mode, I enjoy being ALL female. But, that's just me. We're all different and I agree, people like you who may identify with a blurred gender as a more stable state should be able to express that.

[Guest camille_hope]

Great post.

For me it feels like my whole life is a giant jigsaw puzzle put together with quiet a few pieces missing. I tried filling those pieces with this and that, but recently I think that it needs to be filled with my feminine part of me. So far the pieces fit well and so far the picture is a good looking one.

[Guest leopron]

Wxtracker I can relate to you sooo much. It is great to hear that from someone else, thank you so much .

KatieDesire, I have to agree with you as well, I have seen many women dressed in male style jeans with 4 inch heels and a teeshirt, why can't I do that? On the other hand it is nice to be able to make the entire transition. As of the last 23 years I have not made the entire transition, as with my wife like most of us has been back and forth on this issue many times. She never liked to see me fully dressed but lingerie under my male clothes was acceptable, then my son was born and that even stopped. Before I was married I had dressed a number of times in full transition it was great. Then I met the love of my life and I just knew she could not take it all the way, so I did what I could or rather what she accepted.

So basically what I'm saying is I think that what we do depends upon our given mood, and me personally I can end up anywhere on the gender spectrum, somewhere in between or leaning either way and I do feel comfortable there, because that is how my mood fits me at the given moment.

Thank you for the post , this is goood stuff!

Huggs

leopron