Husband help

I can't speak to your experience but can only share mine with you.

I don't necessarily keep secrets from my wife about my crossdressing. She does not want to be part of my crossdressing so I don't include her in what goes on unless it does involve her such as an evening out with the social club.

I dress sometimes evenings and weekends in the house. My kids know and they are 20 and 13. There is very little they don't know. The 'why do we dress' question is different for everyone. I think that question is most difficult for a wife to understand.

I would share a lot more about it with her if she wanted me to. Some people on this site are very fortunate that their significant other is fully engaged in their crossdressing and are totally open with each other, while others are totally closed off with their significant other when it comes to their crossdressing.

Most likely, the girls you are referring to in your post are also crossdressers. At times, these girls (crossdressers) are a huge support and a source for advice as we did not grow up learning these things.

I hope this is helpful.

FYI. 'Get help using crossdresser heaven' is used for posts regarding navigating the website. You may get more responses if you were to post it in 'life as it goes on'

Hi Lovey,

There is a forum on CDH especially for wives and gf's of us CDs: For Wives and Significant Others Only. They can offer better advice than we can, since it is from a wife's perspective.

But please understand that the girls he talks to online are other CDs, and we are sharing ideas and information as part of the mutual aid society which we are. I'm told it is much the same as the "girl talk" which takes place in women's social groups. This must be difficult for you to understand, but you should know that we ourselves don't know why we do it; we just have to do it.

Hugs,
Bettylou

I can only respond to how my beloved wifey and I have approached my dressing and I hope it helps. I did disclose my love of being feminine and being a cross dresser before we married and she tried to accept and even went out with me some. In very short order she found she didn’t want to be involved with me in that fashion. Our marriage almost ended but we eventually accepted a dont ask dont tell approach. This only kept us from communicating and drove a further different wedge. As we essentially lived separate lives we finally decided it was time to fix things or go our own way. It took many long discussions and time for us to open up. I realized I had never been honest with myself and had lied and deceived not only her but myself and throughout this process realized and accepted I am transgender. Telling her this and both of us learning how to accept each other and be open and honest has allowed us to move forward. We now talk more and even though it isn’t easy we keep at it. I will never transition and know my family, work and personal responsibilities must come first, but she allows me days to go have a girls day by myself shopping and being out. Her only requirement is to act like a proper, middle aged, married lady.
So here are a few things I had issues with; I felt her “questions” were a grilling, or accusations, I felt she hated me and didn’t want me, I felt she didn’t want to talk about “girl” things with me. I can’t speak for her, but I know she just couldn’t understand what my interest was in dressing. Even now some of our conversations start out uncomfortable but the more we talk, the more open we have become and are even able to talk about makeup, fashion and other feminine topics. Our love has grown and I now don’t feel her questions are anything nefarious, just genuine interest and concern. Please hang in and try to continue talking and even making things “light hearted” if possible. Good luck.
🍷C

Hi Lovey, welcome, and thank you for supporting your hubby.
As the other girls have stated, talking to other cd girls, is how we got support, and are able to build confidence in ourselves.
While I told my wife, a few weeks after I admitted it to myself, It was through talking to the other girls here, that I gained the courage to tell my wife about this side of me, and while she is completely supportive and indeed encouraging, of me being "me", I still gain so much knowledge and that confidence from talking and reading my sisters posts, it has and is my lifesaver.
I do often read posts to my wife, and discuss various ideas/questions raised here, with her. She has no wish to become a member, though she is quite happy for me,, that I am a member.
so, rambling aside, communicate, honey, bring up various aspects and discussions, about his crossdressing, transitioning, whatever, just show him that you have a deep interest in what he is doing, as well.
Oh, and my wife an I are best girlfriends, sisters, now, as well as husband and wife.
Hugs, Regi👸💕

Hi Lovey, welcome to CDH! Yeah, this is a hugely complicated topic, much better handled by a couples counselor than me. But, you have gotten some good responses from others. Assuming that the girls he is talking to online means us, I know for me, the other girls here are an enormous support for me. They understand and can relate to me and I can relate to them. That doesn't mean he loves you any less, it's the shared experience with other CDs that we often need. If you are accepting, I don't know why he isn't open to talking to you about it. Sometimes, even when we know someone is accepting, our fear of judgement or being looked at differently gets in the way. But again, this would better be addressed by a good counselor. One way or another, I think open communication is key. Perhaps finding little gestures to demonstrate your acceptance would ease his mind to talking to you about this part of him.

Birel

Lovey,

It’s not clear just how supportive or accepting your are of your husband’s crossdressing, and I am certainly not judging that so please don’t take this in that way - but if you are not really accepting of his crossdressing (and again, that is perfectly OK), your husband will know or sense this and if he loves you the way I suspect he does, he may be trying to make the difficult decision about sharing something with you that he knows you don’t approve of or like, the consequence of which might be hurting your feelings or straining your relationship.  He doesn’t want to do that, so secrecy may be, in his mind, the better option.  It may not seem like his secrecy is driven by his feelings for you, but I’d offer that up for your consideration because I know in my case that this was and is a constant struggle for me with my wife.

The second thing that comes to mind is that he may feel embarrassed about sharing his feminine feelings and/or desires with you.  He is your husband and I would believe that he wants to meet your expectations in that role.  If you can’t reconcile his crossdressing as part of him  (and again that is perfectly OK - your feelings are yours and they are legitimate no matter whether they are supportive of his crossdressing or not), then he’s likely going to be embarrassed about sharing these things with you.  This is also one of my big struggles with my wife of over 35 years - she doesn’t want to talk about these girly details with me and doesn’t want to see me dressed, because these things are incongruent with her need to see me as her classic male husband.   Acknowledging your husband’s crossdressing is different from ‘accepting’ it, and if it is not ‘accepted’ by our wives or significant others, we face a good deal of angst about what, if anything, to share.

You said that you ‘approach it in the wrong way’ when you bring this up with him and I’m not sure what that really means, but if you self-assess that it is the ‘wrong way,’ then perhaps it is?  So how do you approach him about this?  Is it in a way that makes him feel judged, ashamed, or embarrassed?  IMO, if you want him to open up with you in the way he is opening up with others online about all this, then you need to be seen by him in the same way he sees the people he is currently sharing all this stuff with.  I think that could be described by words like: safe, helpful, supportive, complimentary, welcoming, understanding, etc…  If you can’t be seen that way by him, and again, that is perfectly OK because you don’t have to accept or like his crossdressing, but the result will be some degree of secrecy - because as others here have said, he can’t stop being what he is…..a crossdresser (and a husband).

Hopefully that makes some sense and this crossdressing husband’s perspective is somehow helpful to you.  I applaud you for reaching out to this community and hope that somewhere in all the responses you may get that a suitable answer or approach will be revealed.  Thank you also for your openness here, and for your willingness to try to better understand and support your crossdressing husband - I’m so touched, and impressed by you in this regard!

I wish you all the best in this and hope that you both find a way to connect more openly and completely!  Glad to talk more if it would be helpful to you…..feel free to message me.

Marcellette

Hi Lovey Sounds like you got it, you are just approaching the wrong way.Just try to be a friend that shares the same thoughts. He will then see it and feel more comfort about conversing with you. Think of him being a girl friend and your husband at the same time. He is able to do it and why not you.

Luv Stephanie

Hi Lovey,

Welcome to CDH. Please check out the wives and significant other areas of the site too. Always nice to have another GG amongst us. Again welcome.

Alana

I will approach this from a different perspective. Hopefully you are reading these posts as these ladies are well down the path you may go, if you do want to. I'm thinking you do, or you wouldn't post here.

Do you suspect or has he opened up that he is gay or bisexual? Maybe only when he's dressed? That surely can cause issues. I will say that that is not usual.

I assume as well that he doesn't want this to cause a split. So maybe a good approach would be to ask him if he wants to go out on a date. Maybe on an out of town weekend trip. Somewhere you wouldn't run into anyone you know.

Again, I hope you are reading the replies. And respond. Everyone wants to help. And know if what they are saying is helping.

Gwyn

My $0.02, my wife is not open to my cding but knows i do it.  I would like to share it with her but she has no interest.  This mean not only not dressing around her or having things around but also not talking about things like makeup or nailpolish or other things girls would talk about.  I'm not sure how open you and he are or how much he feels you want him to share.  Of course some things are truly just cd issues that a gg would not be aware of.

First off let me thank you for being so supportive of your husband. He may feel awkward talking to you about it so try to make him feel at ease and relaxed. Tell him you want to help him be the best CD he can be. Maybe offer makeup tips or talk fashion or even buy him something pretty to wear. If he doesn't open up to you he is missing a great opportunity that many of us would give anything to have. Be patient with him.

Hi Lovey, I just revealed my crossdressing to my wife two months ago. We've been married 40 years and it's been a big breach of trust for us. I'm certainly no expert, but I elected to do a few things right away that has hopefully made it less painful:

1. Find a good gender or sexual therapist you are comfortable with and work out what this should look like for you both. You may want to have a separate couple therapist to deal with other marital issues as we have.
2. Try to establish some boundaries you can both agree on. If you can at least agree to allow him some periods of "girl time" including online chats or forums, every day or on a weekend, he'll loosen up and be more open.
3. A negative outlook amplifies the guilt and shame he feels already. Ground rules are important - for example, we agreed no girl-stuff during intimacy, but she agreed to let me shave some body hair.
4. Remember, he's still the same person inside that you fell in love with. Rejecting the feminine side of his personality will feel like a rejection of him, and he'll retreat and go back to hiding and sneaking.

Most of us didn't start off thinking "I want to be a crossdresser or trans person". I fell into it as a preschooler, fully in secret, but as I grew older I knew I'd never be able to totally suppress the feminine feelings I wanted to express openly but couldn't. I felt abnormal compared to an "ideal man" and that my wife deserved better. I've always felt like I could never live up to her expectations of me. This just compounded the guilt and shame, until I just could not go on with part of me walled up in secrecy.

I hope you can work things out, and I know our experiences are not exactly the same. It sounds like you have been tolerant, if not accepting. Kudos to you to try to understand and contacting others that are dealing with the same issues.

Maybe you can figure out ways to have fun with it - like a "girls' day out" or getting mani-pedi's together (his doesn't have to be feminine nails and colors). Anything to show each other you want to stay together and value each other will be huge. But your husband needs to step up and meet you halfway, of course. Please keep the dialogue open and use the experienced people on this site as a resource.

All the best

"Brielle"

Take him on a "blind date".

Don't tell him where you are going, but arrange a mani-pedi, followed by a day of shopping and trying on fun things!

Maybe he'll come around and realize he has to look no further than you, to have a "girlfriend" he can have some fun with!