Do you feel dysphoria?

[Barnabas]

For those who started crossdressing as a sexual addiction, do you think you had gender dysphoria from the beginning that helped to stimulate the desire to crossdress and form that addiction? Or do you think the gender dysphoria came in later as you cultivated your false persona as a woman?

Or maybe most of us don't have any gender dysphoria at all and crossdressing was just a sexual addiction?


Remember there is also a difference between being uncomfortable in your gender and masculinity, versus gender dysphoria which is having actual distress about your gender or your body. For me, mostly it was discomfort in male roles or the male experience, not full blown dysphoria.  I'm guessing that is the same for most of you.

[kyork]

As I've said elsewhere, I did not start CDing as a sexual addiction, and that was never my interest, intent, or experience. That being said, the question of whether I have had dysphoria or not and where it came from is still a good question to ask.

Stress has often brought on a time of CDing in my life. It has been a relief, and escape from reality (not so much a rejection of the male role, but an escape from difficulties in life). But I don't think that has brought on dysphoria. Maybe I have had some, it's kind of hard for me to say. There have certainly been times when I have thought I would rather be a woman, but never that I WAS a woman, or was supposed to be one. So, CDing being an escape for me was not an escape from being a man, from masculinity per se, but from difficult life circumstances. So I believe my experience is different than what yours has been like, and what you are guessing about most CDers.

[Barnabas]

Yes you do seem to have a bit of a different experience from many who post here.  But from what I've read in books, your experiences might be the most common of all, but not many people come to this site to talk about it.  While I and others who used to crossdress for sexual pleasure, also found it an escape in times of stress, the books talk about vast numbers of men who wear women's underwear, or other levels of crossdressing, for relief of stress. Some wear such things every day under their clothes at work, or they put on female clothing every day when they get home from work.  The books make it sound like, (I forget the percentage), maybe 50-75% of crossdressers do so not from dysphoria, not for sexual pleasure, but as a comforting thing, or stress relief.

[kyork]

I don't get that "underdressing" thing, but then for me since it's a visual thing, what is concealed doesn't matter. I did it once or twice, but it wasn't any different from not, so what's the point? But from reading others experiences I know it was different for them. In fact I still have women's pants that don't look any different really and I still wear them out. Nobody can tell, and I don't consider it CDing. I'm not trying to present female, and it doeesn't look like I am. I am being conservative in my clothing budget. I have an L.L. Bean sweater that was my mom's. It's not visually gender specific, and I have gotten compliments on it when I've worn it. I told one friend of mine who commented on it that it was my mom's and he said he wouldn't have known, it looked good on me. There are a lot of clothes now that are basically unisex. I don't get any different feeling by wearing such things, and it doesn't make me want to dress fully. It's not a comfort thing, or stress relief. They're just clothes that either gender could wear, and nobody would think to comment on.

I think that those who CD for comfort don't have that shame/guilt feeling nearly as much as those who CD for sexual reasons. There is still the shame issue if you would be discovered (because of societal lack of understanding and condemnation). I should say, the feeling that shame would occur should you be discovered, but that fear of discovery is not strong if you are careful about it, as the possibility of being discovered is very small. I never felt ashamed or guilty afterwards. But no one ever knew.

[Signpost]

I have never hated my body. I hate my life and have been trying to be anyone else, as different from the old me as possible, in order to stop being bullied and persecuted. I was a citizen of a culture of only 3 people while I was growing up -my mother, my father, and me. My parents fought like cats and dogs, which led me to ask which part of myself which I inherited from each of them was in the right. My mother won most of the arguments, so perhaps that got me started. Then society started bashing men in general, calling us "toxic", which didn't help me want to resolve myself as a man.