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“What’s in a name”, the bard asks. Well for me in my first marriage it may have been the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. My ex knew I struggled with gender incongruity. Though I rarely, rarely, rarely put on a woman’s garments the very fact that I wanted to repulsed her.
Since going to therapy screamed “mentally ill husband” as therapy I kept a written journal. It was discovered and in it my ex learned that her husband perceived himself as “herself named Charlene; aka Charrie. This discovery may have been the final nail in the coffin wherein our marriage was buried. It broke my heart for so much of my heart was in that book, that in her contempt and utter disgust over what she read was in truth a thorough rejection of me, at that time her husband.
My current wife knew of my gender incongruity prior to marriage. She had even offered to let me wear one of her dresses “but no boobs” i.e. “yes you are welcome to be a man in a dress if that will help you.”
However that won’t help. She accepts my gender struggle, but it is clear she doesn’t understand that I am female in essence. Being a man in a dress won’t help because the man does not want to wear the dress. I, Charlene Victoria, desires to be, and the most satisfying way ( at this point) for me to be me is to present as myself, a conservative mature woman.
The last few days of guilt free dressing unhindered by very little has grown my femme self. This time is coming to a close. I have grown. I don’t want to be relegated to being suppressed again and lose what I have so wonderfully and powerfully gained.
As my wife gains health I am hoping she will get well enough to be able to hear me out and learn how deeply femme I really am.
Whew! All that to ask this. What is your advice. Should I tell her that I am Charlene? Do I mention that I have a name? a name that I love; a name that in my heart brings together so much of whom I am and long to be. Have you told your SO your feminine name?
Or is that a subject for a whole separate discussion?
Your kind counsel is much appreciated.
Kindly
Charrie
Charrie,
Food for thought; and I’m sorry to hear you are among those with non-accepting spouses.
My wife has known me by my guy name since long before we were married – 60 years altogether – and could not imagine me as Bettylou, even though she mostly accepts her. And I think of myself as Bettylou most, if not all the time, even in drab environments. I can respond to both names, just as when a child, I was mostly known as “Buster”. You are the same person, whatever name or title you use. IMO, you should let your wife call you as the person she sees, and perhaps some day she will “see” Charrie.Hi Charlene, Yes, I’ve told my wife (several times as she keeps forgetting it – on purpose I think). She knows that I dress and is fine as long as I don’t overdue it in front of her. My daughter and granddaughter also know my name and I think my son does too BUT they don’t know that I dress daily (altho I think my daughter suspects it). The reason my whole family knows is because my Mom is the one who gave me my name. She always wanted a daughter and while she was pregnant she kept thinking that I would be born a girl. So I asked her if she had picked a name for me and without blinking she told me “Krista”. I’ve used it ever since. So back to my SO, I have a feeling she isn’t crazy about me having a female name, even with my great “how I got my name” story. The other day my SO found that I had an email account using Krista in it (I needed a backup email account as I’ve had several apps hacked from my primary email account). I got the tsk, tsk from her. Seems she is more bothered by the name than the dressing. I guess my advice is to be very careful about how you go about sharing your name with your SO, especially if you don’t have a mom story like I have. Good Luck!!!!
Happy New Year, Hugs, KristaI should not have voted as I have legally changed my name to Breanna Leigh and I don’t hide my feminine name or self from anyone. All my friends and associates call me by my legal, real name, Breanna Leigh although from time to time those closest to me use my ex-male name by mistake.
My biggest problem has been signing checks and documents, I forget a lot and scribble my old signature. LoL
My wife, a couple of my kids, a couple of close friends, my sister and some of the girls at the stores I frequent.
Hello Charrie,
I attend a ladies (GG’s) luncheon every few months and the ladies there know me as Michelle, as do the informal group of GG’s that I keep in touch with regularly when in town. These ladies (about 15-20 of them) range in age from late teens to mid-sixties and work at various locations and in a variety of jobs (cafes, bars, hotels, boutiques, cosmetic shops, casino, etc). Only a few know my male name.
My dear wife on the other hand does not know my feminine name. She is aware of my x-dressing but is not supportive at all and can’t bear to see me dressed. However, we have come to an agreement where I am allowed to go out dressed en femme once a month; I would definitely prefer going out much more frequently, but for the sake of our marriage I try to stick to our agreement. I think that if I told her my feminine name she would become even more negative and stressed. She was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease over 5 years ago and this has added significantly to her stress levels and intolerance of my dressing.
As to whether you should tell your wife that you are Charlene, I don’t really think a name is important; much better to tell her about your strong feminine desires and try to get her to understand this side of you.
All the best and hugs from Michelle.
I am out with my name to my wife, a few close friends, and my CDH sisters. I never really thought about a female name until I needed to come up with one to join CDH about a year ago. The process of settling on a name actually delayed me joining CDH for a while. After sleeping on it, I narrowed the list down to a handful of names and my wife really preferred Rochelle–a name I was leaning toward as well. So Rochelle is fortunate to be my wife’s GF from time to time.
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