Coping Wiith Transvestitism

Most transvestites hide their need to cross-dress. They keep it secret from their parents, siblings, friends, workmates, neighbours, even their wives. It isn't hard to pretend to be normal because, in every other way, the transvestite is normal. But it is hard to suppress the urge to dress up. So the majority of transvestites yield to the urge then live in fear of being discovered. They also live with the constant pain of hiding their true nature from the people they love.
Some transvestites 'come out' to their wives, if to nobody else. TV discussion groups are full of the angst they feel about this. Many transvestites are divorced because of their confession. Others live with women who cannot understand but will tolerate their husband's strange behaviour - women who then also bear the burden of hiding the weirdness of their home lives from their own friends and family.

I do not believe that transvestitism is something which can easily be 'integrated' into a man's personality. From what I have said about my beliefs about the origins of transvestitism, it should be no surprise that I see it as an alien growth on the male psyche, not a natural part of being human that most men somehow repress. In fact, I would go so far as to suggest that the attempt to integrate transvestitism into one's self-image can seriously distort the transvestite's view of himself and the world. The view that transvestitism is merely an expression of an innate 'feminine side' to our nature is not helpful in explaining why it happens, who is affected and why transvestitism is experienced just the way it is. Men trying to cope with transvestitism often appear to have quite fragmented images of themselves and of their gender and, sometimes, serious confusion about their sexual orientation - all of which is quite understandable if we think of transvestitism as an abnormal and disfiguring growth on the side of an otherwise normal psyche.

The conclusion I have come to is that there is no way of 'dealing' with transvestitism and there is certainly no 'cure'. All that sufferers can hope for is to be able to cope with it. That is, we need to find ways of managing transvestitism so that it does not damage or impoverish our lives too much, so that we protect our loved ones from the harm it can do to them, and so that we can still enjoy and benefit from the positive aspects of this most peculiar affliction.

The first step to coping with transvestitism is to understand what it is. I have a 'working hypothesis' that satisfies me for the moment but I have no doubt that there will be many others who strongly disagree. It is also worth remembering that I wouldn't need this website if I was 100% confident that I really understand what transvestitism is all about. So remember that everything I say here about coping is predicated on my current, imperfect understanding and take it with a pinch of salt.

First of all, we each have to decide who is going to know about our transvestitism. In a perfect world, we'd all just come out and and everyone would accept us. But the world isn't like that. If I am right about the causes of transvestitism, then normal people are programmed to dislike transvestites as much as we are programmed to be transvestites. Even if I'm wrong, there is no denying a strong negative sentiment in people in general towards cross-dressing males. There is also a lot of confusion about the relationship between cross-dressing and homosexuality. There is a general distrust of, fear of, and hostility towards any kind of sexual 'perversion' and, to top it all, a common aversion to anyone who is in any way different. This isn't to say that every transvestite who comes out is shunned or vilified by his friends and neighbours. I don't want to exaggerate this. But the mere fact of being different in this way means that, if you reveal it, it will alter your relationships with the people around you - almost certainly adversely - and it will begin to define you socially.

Personally, I refuse to be defined by a minor aberration in my sexual make-up. My transvestitism is a secret therefore except from my wife. I have revealed it to my wife because:

1. I was confident that she loved me enough to tolerate the fact for my sake.
2. I knew I could count on her to keep my secret.
3. It would have been intolerable to have had such a big secret between us.
4. I selfishly hoped she would allow me to cross-dress at home.

The down-side of telling my wife has been:

1. She too now has the burden of this secret - with none of the benefits.
2. While she tolerates my cross-dressing, she cannot understand it and this has caused a little distance between us.

Generally, my coping strategy for transvestitism has been to reveal it on a 'need to know' basis. I don't have children who live with me but, if I did, I would almost certainly not tell them. I don't believe that children should be made to cope with their parents' problems unless it becomes unpreventable. I can see no way that it would benefit a child to know its father cross-dressed and many ways in which the knowledge could hurt it.

The question of who should be in on the secret is also a matter of how strong the urge to cross-dress is felt by each individual. Some transvestites are satisfied to cross-dress only rarely. Some, although the need is greater, can go for years without giving in to it if circumstances require them to.

For some transvestites, the Web, email, chat rooms, support groups and outings to transvestite clubs and bars allow them to talk about their issues to like-minded and understanding people, or just to be themselves in the company of people who do not condemn them. Part of this need to socialise is the perfectly normal desire by transvestites to find a society in which they do not feel like outsiders and freaks. My own view is that, by my own definition, I am a freak but I am quite unusual in not caring much about it . It is hard to get reliable statistics on how common transvestitism is so I don't know just how freakish to feel but my impression is that it is a lot more common than most people believe. What is more, it is a normal and natural phenomenon, something which probably arises out of the natural variability of the human developmental process. While being a transvestite has its difficulties and drawbacks, it is probably only as rare as being extremely tall or short and is probably easier to live with.

Accepting this view is important in finding an appropriate way to cope with transvestitism. Self-delusion is not coping and will most likely lead to undesirable consequences. For example, if I believed that transvestitism was caused by men getting in touch with their 'feminine side', I might wrongly conclude that any man could be educated into appreciating cross-dressing. This could lead me to evangelise the practice to my friends and family. It might also lead me to adopt misguided child-rearing practices.

As well as guiding one’s dealings with the rest of the world, one’s model of the causes of transvestitism help one to find an appropriate model of one's own Self. Here, my beliefs about why I am a transvestite mean that:

• I don't try to convince myself that I am a male and a female person in one body. Disintegrating one’s personality like that cannot be healthy.
• I can accept that I am a whole and complete male with all the usual masculine traits and desires - but with an unusual oddity in one small area of my character.
• My desire to look and act feminine is bounded. That is, although the urge is strong in me, knowing its relationship to the rest of my life helps me control it when I need to.
• I don't worry about my sexual orientation.
• I don't worry about making myself look exactly like a woman, perfecting 'the illusion', or 'passing' for a woman. This urge is best satisfied if I don't use externally-set, objective criteria of feminine appearance. I can feel better about myself if I don't judge myself that way. After all, I don't need to compete for a male like a woman does - I just need to make myself happy.
• I can understand my wife's inability to understand me - not just sympathise but really understand it. Apart from the kind of abstract, evolutionary explanations I gave in my essay on causes, there really is no explanation for this kind of innate drive that would satisfy anyone. Such things are like emotional atoms from which our personalities are built — there is no looking inside them.
• I can understand it that my wife finds me physically unattractive when I'm cross-dressed. After all, if our roles were reversed and she was trying to look like a man (with a false beard, her breasts strapped down flat and a fake penis in her jockey shorts) I'm pretty sure I wouldn't find it a turn-on!

All of these things make being a transvestite more bearable. Yet there is always the loneliness that keeping such a secret brings, always the bitter sense of the injustice of being the one in a thousand who is afflicted, always the struggle to maintain one's self-esteem in the face of what is, for me at least, a hopeless and pathetic need to be pretty and sexy. All the understanding in the world won't make these feelings go away.

For some transvestites, I see a bold attempt to make a virtue out of a necessity. These men flaunt their cross-dressing, they affirm the positive and glamorous aspects of being 'transgendered' and they re-organise their lives and relationships so that cross-dressing can become a primary focus for enjoyment and social interaction. I have no data on how this works out for them. I find it hard to believe that this represents a long-term coping strategy and I suspect they may be more unhappy afterwards than when they started. Nevertheless, I salute their courage and I envy them their freedom to act out their desires - however briefly. Some of these people also attempt to politicise transvestitism, trying to help transvestites to be able to live and work openly while cross-dressed. They seek a reduction or elimination of the social stigma attached to cross-dressing and they seek appropriate medical and legal treatment for transvestites. Again, this is a brave and laudable thing to do and I wish them every success. I suspect that such people will not like my ideas and I look forward to hearing their persuasive arguments for other points of view.