So I've seen many many girls pre and post transition say that the urge to crossdress brought them relieve of their dysphoria. Are there any girls who NEVER felt like cross dressing while still presenting as men?
In my case, I had persistent fantasies and thoughts about being a woman and everytime I imagined it, it would bring me joy and happiness. I also felt boredom and apathy towards my life.
Except for a couple of times in Halloween, and a couple of times trying makeup and a wig after starting HRT, I never felt the need to cross dress. I still don't feel it, if anything I think seeing a man in a dress in front of a mirror would make me more depressed and annoyed. Yet I feel somehow less trans cuz I never got these urges that so many of you girls had. My discomfort never gave me the need to dress like a woman, it was just a constant desire to be one and feeling like life would be much better if I was.
I started laser and HRT (which I've now stopped thanks to fear and doubts) and even when I was sure of what I wanted, I kept telling myself I wouldn't dress as a female until I felt physically ready to do so. I didn't feel the need to do it before. At all.
What about you?
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I've talked about this before. I bought a few things and tried them on, then cried because I looked so much like the canonical "man in a dress." I tried again periodically but until I saw a woman in the mirror didn't even try to go out that way.
I actually never dressed and went out until my endo started getting frustrated and suspicious. Then I dressed for him. Now male clothes make me feel the way female clothes used to. BTW, cross dressing to me is wearing male clothes and I did that for 54 years.
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April 22, 2015, the day of my first face to face pass in gender neutral clothes and no makeup. It may be months to the next one, but I'm good with that!
Being transgender is just a phase. It hardly ever starts before conception and always ends promptly at death.
They say the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train. I say, climb aboard!
Think outside the voice box!
Quote from: Dee Marshall on September 08, 2017, 01:09:55 PM
"man in a dress."
I really hated that feeling. I also hated having to use forms to get the correct shape, so I didn't cross dress too much.
As a kid, I dressed so often in my big sisters clothes that she would come looking for them in my room. I denied everything and played stupid....but one day she asked me to come into her room. She had moved everything that was ok for me to grab to one side of her closet and things she didn't want me to touch to the other (her only comment on me dressing in her clothes was that I was weird). I was still very innocent at the time so there was no sexual element. It would take many many years for me to even consider that I was transgender. For me and most others I've talked to, this is just a part of who we are. If you don't need or want to transition....then don't, you don't have to. I will tell you that for me and others I've talked to, the feelings associated with being trans just never went away...even when I tried very hard to make them.
The cross dressing isn't really cross dressing any more....it's just wearing clothes. I do like shopping and I do prefer dresses, at least at work....but other than work, its jeans, a sports bra and a t-shirt.
The whole man in a dress is hard to overcome, like other posters have said I didn't want to be that person.
I had the feelings for a long time before I went to see a therapist, for me passing was/is important because being gendered correctly means a lot to me.
So I never dressed until I made that decision that I was going to transition and even then I didn't enjoy it at first because I felt like a man in a dress.
Everyone is different and all of us found cross dressing helpful so I would say your not alone.
I found as time passed and my hair grew out and I started hormones, got my ears done ect I started to feel less make a man I a dress and more like a woman in men's clothes, that was when I knew it was time to go full time.
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I just wanted to point out that, even with a slow start, even with a feeling that you're a fraud, you eventually get there. Now, even without any surgeries, I'm a woman, full stop.
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April 22, 2015, the day of my first face to face pass in gender neutral clothes and no makeup. It may be months to the next one, but I'm good with that!
Being transgender is just a phase. It hardly ever starts before conception and always ends promptly at death.
They say the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train. I say, climb aboard!
Think outside the voice box!
I know I wanted to wear my sister's things long before I ever heard of trans or GCS.
I was able to get past being ugly by getting drunk first. It was kind of like wearing beer goggles for the mirror. That was another good reason to find a way to get rid of the dysphoria and one effect of HRT is that I stopped drinking almost entirely. My last one was last Christmas.
Not sure if this counts, but I used to cross dress in private into really lacy, frilly things to feel feminine through most of my life. When I finally came out to the world and began an official transition, I tried to dress "feminine" and dressed super-stereotypical housewife. It was awkward to say the least, and others have captured the sentiment well. Anyway, I've decided I am not really a frilly kind of woman...probably more a tomboy. So that's how I dress most of the time.
I wear mixed gender clothes that fit my shape, personality, and express how I want to express myself. Right now I have on striped socks, dark denim women's pants, a womens cashmere blend v-neck sweater vest over a slim fit oxford. I have small hoop earrings that just fit around my lobes with some dangle, and I have a small messenger bag. People often mistake me for a gay man. Because of my personal comfort, I am not fond of dresses (though I did marry my wife wearing one...because....wedding!)
Quote from: Deborah on September 08, 2017, 02:38:31 PM
....and one effect of HRT is that I stopped drinking almost entirely. My last one was last Christmas.
Congratulations on slaying your dragon!!! :) :eusa_clap: :icon_rockon: :icon_joy:
I tried cross dressing a few times because I just felt a need. I also found that cross dressing was just not satisfying. I purged several times and convinced myself that more masculine activities would help me out of my dysphoria. This did not work either.
For me, my dysphoria was a matter of my sense of being within my mind. The external dressing was of little importance. Even today, I usually wear shorts and a T-shirt. When the need arises, I will dress up and put on some make-up. It is no big deal for me. I just do it because it somehow seems the normal thing to do.
One part i recognize is the sorrow of seeing a man in a dress in the mirror. It can be hard until you learn to accept
It doesn't do nearly as much for my dysphoria as my graphic novel in production and the internet where I don't have to meet face to face and be gendered wrong. Dressing up has a role, and an important one, but it's more knowing you can present as feminine that provides the relief rather than actually presenting fem alot.
I am so there with you on this, Charlie. I always ached to have a female body and still do. And yet, all I've really wanted to do was dress as a woman similar to how I do in this male body. Jeans, Chuck Taylors, cool t-shirts with jackets. And to be honest, this is part of why I've yo-y0-ed on transition so much. I want to do this just to feel comfortable but then I feel like because I'm not a girly girl at all, I'm not trans and have no right to do this. I STILL feel that. It's nice to know that I'm maybe not alone in this.
One great test I came across was to see yourself in a mirror with a feminine form in male clothes, and then the same dressed up as a woman. Sure enough, I'd respond to being dressed male but with hips and a bustline, not so much as a flat chested narrow woman. If my genes don't do their stuff the HRT might leave me as an AA but oh well. The clothes are a bit secondary, although anything in this regard is modifying your body in a sense, even slightly modifying how you speak, as much as hormones or surgery.
I'm still a bit blase about makeup, but try to do at least one thing to learn about transitioning every day. Today I learned that thickened nail polish can be thinned out again by simply putting it in hot water! I have a whole bag of bottles I bought cheap.
My question was basically who didn't crossdress and never felt the need to before transitioning? I see some of the answers were the exact opposite of my question, people stealing their sister's clothes etc. That's nice but that's the more common trans narrative that didn't happen to me and I was expecting to find others who never crossdressed.
As I said I only did it a couple of times for Halloween (which in my mind don't count much cuz I didn't do it to deal with dysphoria, I was just putting on a costume for fun) and then 2 months ago after I started HRT I bought a wig a put on makeup a couple of times to see how I looked. I didn't really feel anything special besides finding flaws everywhere that I don't really see dressed as a man.
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First time I crossdressed was age 31. As a kid, I was more into using toys rather than clothes, as a teen I would listen to the radio alot but thats when pressures to conform as masculine in school an be tough were at their greatest, as a young adult, I was into gaming, and my focus became art and writing as an adult. There was always other coping methods and you tell yourself "I don't have the face for it", it wasn't through fascination with womens wear or wanting to look good that led me to first start dressing up it was out of desperation and depression where you eventually just have to. You just think screw it, YOLO. (You only live once).
Quote from: Bfp2 on September 08, 2017, 01:20:39 PM
As a kid, I dressed so often in my big sisters clothes that she would come looking for them in my room. I denied everything and played stupid....but one day she asked me to come into her room. She had moved everything that was ok for me to grab to one side of her closet and things she didn't want me to touch to the other (her only comment on me dressing in her clothes was that I was weird). I was still very innocent at the time so there was no sexual element. It would take many many years for me to even consider that I was transgender. For me and most others I've talked to, this is just a part of who we are. If you don't need or want to transition....then don't, you don't have to. I will tell you that for me and others I've talked to, the feelings associated with being trans just never went away...even when I tried very hard to make them.
The cross dressing isn't really cross dressing any more....it's just wearing clothes. I do like shopping and I do prefer dresses, at least at work....but other than work, its jeans, a sports bra and a t-shirt.
Cool sister. Does she know that you're trans now?
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Most of my life I crossdressed only infrequently. The few times I did I was disturbed by how it emphasized my masculine features. I chose instead to find male analogues for feminine clothing such as men's bikini underwear.
My last year before starting hormones I crossdressed almost all the time at home because it was the only thing that helped the dysphoria. But after a year it was not enough, so I started HRT.
Hiding in mannoflage, in plain sight, I can't bear the prospect of being the centre of attention, the closer it comes the worse I feel, and the desire to flee and hide, and cry is overwhelming.
Rowan
Hi Charlie. To be honest, I was exactly the same. I crossdressed as part of a bucks party once with an op-shop dress but apart from that my first real experience wearing women's clothing was some bikini briefs i tried on a week post op SRS. The idea of being a man in drag never appealed to me.
I never really cross-dressed except for maybe bra and panties. I wear skinny jeans when out and if I wear a tight shirt I look reasonably feminine (from the neck down, of course) even when I don't really care to. I don't like drawing attention to myself so I am careful to "down dress" many times in order to look more male (to match my masculine face). Otherwise, I am a contradiction to folks. I have a few pink feminine-looking shirts that I wear whenever I want to feel like myself outside the house. But no, never dresses or skirts for me at any time. Just no desire for that...