My SO

Without putting a name or a face to my SO, I just want to say a little about her. The context will be only how she deals with my girl side, since most who read this aren't interested in my boy side's relationship with her, and I'm not really keen on sharing it.

Discovery
First let me start with how she found out. About 6 years ago, I was living in a small 'single' apartment (as I was told, the only difference between a single and bachelor apartment is the presence of a kitchen). I was CDing back then, but not to the extent that I do now. I had plenty of heels and lingerie, but few clothes and even less makeup and wigs. EVEN less than that was my closet space, so when my girlfriend moved in with me, there was really nowhere to hide it except under other boxes in the closet.

One day I came home, and she asked me about the boxes in the closet. Feeling my face flush immediately, I ever-so-cunningly asked, 'What boxes?' She said she thought I was keeping another woman's stuff there, but maybe deep down she was hoping that I was, and that it wasn't mine. I told her they were mine and she told me to prove it and put a pair of the heels on. Now usually there are these forced-feminization stories that start this way, but believe me, there was no stirrings of sexual excitement, or rush of blood to my male parts, just plain old heart beating a mile a minute and humiliation on the side. I refused her demand, and at that point went into trying to explain what I do and why I do it. There were lots of tears and yelling that night, but somehow we made it here, six years later.

Discovery, part II
Now we live in a different place, and in a different area. And since that time, starting about 2005, I began to experiment with makeup and clothes. I'm not sure what the catalyst was, I had tried makeup many times before, but without success, and without much desire to improve it. Maybe it was the internet. Maybe it was finding a website that not only gave tips on how to apply makeup, but had an Asian face in the pictures for the example. I practiced and practiced, and when I finally thought I looked decent enough, I decided to start an online profile and post some pictures. This is an issue my SO and I still deal with to this day, and that is why I would want to put myself out there in the first place. I'm not sure how she found out, but one day I found a request on my chat and recognized it as possibly her screen name. From then on I knew she knew what I was up to, and I realize how shady it must have looked to her. She knew that I was chatting other people, and that I was showing my pictures and info on the internet, but the most important thing she did not know was, why?

The Reason
I would love to speak for all crossdressers, but while we all have similarities in how we arrived at crossdressing, we have very different motivations and desires about it. One thing I would dare say is that most of us spend, or have spent, most of our lives trying to figure out why we do it. And for the most part, never really find out why, just a very elementary answer to the question why, 'Because.' Fortunately for me, my SO, at the beginning of the second discovery phase, did her own research on the internet to try to understand. And at that point I think she knew that this was not going away easily, if at all. During that time she must surely have stumbled upon these websites we are all familiar with, and probably to her disgust, pictures of the man she loved wearing heels higher than her own, skirts shorter than her own, and makeup more provocative than her own (I couldn't think of a better word, but didn't want to use sluttier). So why? Why did I want people to see me that way, why did I want people to chat with me? Was I advertising myself for a secretive hookup? Was I trying to go outside of the relationship? As I type this, I am reminded of how much I try to understand how she was feeling, and why she couldn't accept the answer I gave her. To be accepted.

Acceptance
Not the kind where we accept who we are, but where we seek acceptance and reassurance that we're doing the right thing. Or in some cases, doing the wrong thing, but doing it right. My SO was totally right to suspect that I'd be on the social networks and chats looking to hookup, after all, that's what many people are there to do. But what I had a hard time explaining to her was that I felt all alone in a sea of people, and was just seeking some way not to feel like I was drowning and no one knew why. The world for crossdressers is completely different now, and I witnessed a huge step in its evolution, with the help of the internet. And one thing that my SO, and even younger crossdressers may not understand, is how lonely it was before the internet 'showed' me there were others like me. It's bad enough that society already says that a man should not dress like a woman, unless for theatrical reasons, but to know that and already want to do that, makes for a very difficult time growing up. We didn't have websites to tell us that there were 5XX,XXX other men dressed as women online, or that it might not be a disease, according to doctors halfway across the world. We didn't even have ways to secretly buy things as easily as we do now. So while it seems a little adolescent to still be seeking acceptance from others, it is only because it is an issue that still needs to be resolved. Having spent a few decades almost shamefully dealing with who I am, it is a relief to find that, even though it might not be ok in other peoples' eyes, at least I'm not going through this by myself, and that the others who are experiencing it will accept me, solely based on our shared experiences.

The Compromise
As I mentioned earlier, we're in a different place, and it's a different time. The compromise that we came up with, and is ever evolving, is that I dress at home (which is her place), when I want, as long as she's not here. I also maintain profiles and pictures, and now this blog, without chatting online or posting suggestive pics (that's kind of subjective). This is not a set of restrictions that she has put on me, but as the title suggests, compromises that we agree on. As we are ever evolving, I now feel more comfortable in my own skin, more assured about my own dressing, and while I do miss some of the friendships I developed for the short period I was chatting, do not feel the need to hear that I am convincing or passable, as I did before. I hope those friends understand, and that for me, reading about how each other is doing is the best way for me to keep in touch.