Since I have some free time before my first class today, I was using the opportunity to be Mere, wearing some of the new items I treated myself to yesterday. Sure enough, the doorbell rings and it's that dude who does handyman work for us. I didn't know he was coming here today!!!! I had to change into drab in record time, and I HATE THAT!!! I know he wouldn't appreciate seeing Meredith.

I hate it when she doesn't tell me someone is coming over!!!

Don't be offended but I'm getting a good laugh from this.
My landlord has great timing as does the lady that lives 2 doors down. She's an older lady that needs help with things at times. I'm more than happy to help. But I can't just through a shirt on over my forms.

Oh, I am not offended! It is funny because it's happened before. In fact, I wrote a blog about it some time back. Just when I can fully be myself, oh, DAMN IT!!!!!!

I actually pass up chances to dress for a few hours now. I used to "get off" a bit on the fear of discovery and the urges to dress were stronger. Now the stress disturbs Wendy's "Wa" and I prefer to dress only when I can be totally relaxed about it. The urges are less intense, more of a longing than a compulsion. My theory is that the compulsiveness was a reflection of Wendy trying to break free all my life. Now that she is free, I don't need to dress to be her. However, I still love getting dressed, it's just that now I look for clothes that are appropriate for housework and cooking.


As someone whose work causes her to sleep at odd hours, I developed a number of methods (while living alone) to ensure I don't get surprise visits.

Everyone I know, knows to call on the phone first. Nobody wants me glaring at them going "You just cost me hundreds of dollars!" and I'm not a "morning person". Callers, that I fielded, were easily dissuaded with "I'm sorry, I have a migraine" or "Ummmm, er, we are kind of busy, can you give us...um, er, 20 minutes to .....finish?" which usually bought me an hour.

I put "do not disturb" signs on my door. Everyone ignored them...well, once. I switched to "NO SMOKING, OXYGEN IN USE" and "DAY SLEEPER". People left me alone. Secondary benefit. Perpetrators figure there is always someone home.

Hopefully, I can reach the point of "Fine, come on over but I'm Wendy today".

Assuming that you are right, sandra, and that I am wrong about the psychodynamic etiology of my severly diminished "urges" to dress (it's no longer crossdressing to Wendy)......

Why on Earth would I want to do that? Why would I WANT to diminish my sexual feelings? I'm happy as a Valley Girl, on Ventura Blvd., with her dad's AMEX Gold Card. Why would I want to REDUCE my sexuality? I'd rather poke a red hot needle into soft and sensitive parts of my anatomy. Is there something nifty about being asexual and celibate that I missed?

Sandra, I am not being sarcastic, I really fail to see the benefit, especially since I do not want to stop dressing en femme. Hell I'd like to start feeling sexual urges to dress en homme. I'd take estrogen to make that happen.

I enjoy sex more now as a woman than ever as a man. But I´m a bad example, because I actually never enjoyed being a man or sex as a man. So, anything is better than that to me.

Laura

What I hear you saying, Sandra, is that removal of testosterone changed your sexual urges to bring your body's responses more in line with what your female brain felt "right"/comfortable with.

I suspect that I would be less pleased with the results considering my bi-/inter-gendered Self, since I clearly retain, through congenital or life-conditioned brain structure (and I was a slow starter being sexually active as a male...had to "learn" to be interested... the ability to respond in both masculine and feminine ways to sex (but not both at once, "The Twins" don't do "incest")

If I'm misreading any comments in this posting please forgive me.

As for being aroused when dressing, don't (some) women often get turned on when they wear something sexy? There have been many times when I had to wear sexy drab for my wife (like underwear) and getting massively turned on because I knew what was going to happen. My wife has gotten turned on dressing in certain items - and not necessarily lingerie - because of what we would do next. Tell me there is never a correlation between dressing - for whatever purposes - and sexuality.

I'm not going to get into a discussion myself as to why I dress, or if I get turned on, whatever. My whole point in this thread was to moan in a humorous way over almost being caught again. I wish I could do what Wendy said about having people not visit because Meredith is visiting.

One last little thing - that handyman dude always calls before stopping by to see if anyone is home first. He has a key to the house, but at the time I was online and couldn't get his call.

a good pont there meredith - there is a difference between getting sexual kicks from dressing, and feeling sexy from dressing well. men and women alike can feel sexy just from dressing well (in their own clothes), looking hot, feeling good about themsleves. it's something that's never happened to me as a man, male clothes are alien to me, and i've never felt good in them, but a nice dress, a perfectly fitting skirt, and i feel good if not damned sexy, but it doesn't mean i rush to the bathroom and... (complete that sentence yourself!)
feeling sexy through being well-dressed has nothing to do with testosterone, maybe it's not an urge either, just a general desire to feel comfortable and look good to others. i know that some tv's dress mainly because of the "urge" which i assumed sandra was originally referring to, ie the dressing is a sexual "aid" for them, but in my experience it would seem that many, if not most tv's dress merely to express their transgenderism, their true nature, and it has nothing to do with thrills. it frustrates me when i see transvestism associated with sexual fetish by definition. it is most certainly not always the case. (the more astute psychologists these days have a sub-group for that: fetishistic transvestism).
as for meredith's original point, i have been dressing at home for the past 10 years or so, only wearing drab when i was expecting guests, but of course in that time there have been many unexpected visitors! and yes, i bloody hate it when that happens, there can be nothing worse than a knock at your door when you're all dolled up in your best dress, especially when it's quite probably one of your parents who is knocking. i usually had an "escape plan"; tried to keep male clothes handy into which i could change, but when i did manage to do that and answer the door my heart was beating so fast, it can't be good for a girl. horrible feeling.
ironically now that my dad knows i dress at home he will never turn up unannounced again! though hopefully he won't be so scared by it once he's actually seen me dressed.

well i can't help it if you're so innocent shan!
spoken like a true transsexual; no comprehension of fetishistic dressing. proud of you babe.
xx
i'm a bit worried about you drinking from the toilet bowl, though the shower head in the mouth doesn't surprise me at all.

As long as it is after the flush Shan please!

I know what you mean Mere, I've had a few close calls in the past but these days if the postman calls and I'm all dolled up I answer the door as I am, he's probably seen all sorts!

Thankfully we have an entry system and a sluggish lift so it gives me a few minutes to clean up and switch back if I have too, and it is amazing how fast the slap comes off - takes ages to get on though!

Alex
xxx

Mere,
Totally agree with you on the sexuality of dressing thing. I don't dress to get turned on sexually. I used to dress because of a MUCH stronger urge than sex. If my sexual urges had been as strong as my urges to "crossdress", I would damn near have been a rapist. I risked damage to my life that was horrendous to contemplate. Being found out might well have resulted in suicide or leaving my home and family. I have never wanted sex THAT badly. The fact that I may have had sexual feelings while dressed is a secondary effect...who knows what is associated or crosswireed in my brain.

Now, I do get that slow, erotic build-up while getting "ready" when I'm dressing in "party" clothes, and that can take hours. I'm staring into a mirror, making up my face and picking clothes and jewelry and trying my best to make myself look "enticing". That arousal, however, is still not WHY I do it, in fact less so, but it happens as a secondary effect. I don't drink milk from a glass to get a white moustache, but I do get one. A major clue to me is that I used to undress immediatly if I had an orgasm while crossdressed. If I have one now, while dressed...I do not undress...(in fact I'm usually lying around in a "glow"). That is not only not the point of dressing, but the guilt/fear thing isn't operational. I watched it fade away over the last year when there were only three time-periods in which I got to dress. But it is very much the "making yourself attractive to a potential mate" effect and may well be hardwired. The real point here is that there is more than one thing going on here. The brain is complex and intra-active. I keep pointing out they have found over 50 genetic markers in mice for sexuality. For some people, crossdressing for sex is an end to itself. Good for them! Enjoy. For others it is more. For some it is not sexual at all...just as dressing en homme is not sexual for me. There are very complex brain functions operating here. It would be unreasonable to suppose only one factor was operational, and that it would be the same for every person.

Lucy,
Your point is well made. If a man can feel like he is putting on his armor to fight/hunt when he dresses (In a three-piece banker's suit, for example), why can't a woman feel appropriate responses as she makes herself desirable. This is not political correctness, it is evolutionary biology. A woman's "job" in evolutionary biology is to find and attract a mate, get pregnant, keep the mate close for security and food, give birth, raise the child until it is old enough to breed the next generation. Sex is fun because people for whom sex felt good, bred more and won the genetic lottery with their offspring. So why should there not be a similar stimuli to reward effective breeding behavior in females. They did it, they attracted males, bred and won the gentic lottery. Natural selection favors horny and sexually fulfilled parents. Men get horny every time they look at a woman because their "job" is to get as many women pregnant with THEIR offspring as possible...because the ones who were horny, did. It's as simple as why trails go around hills instead of over them. It works best.

Fetishism is generally associated with specific objects to obtain sexual arousal (shoe, stocking), it does not involve crossdressing which, as Lucy correctly pointed out, is termed transvestic fetishism. Both, however are done FOR THE PURPOSE of sexual arousal and usually are REQUIRED for the person to be sexually aroused. I can't remember once in my live thinking: "Oh, I'll get dressed in women's clothes so I can be sexually aroused" as I would think "Oh, I'll open up this PLAYBOY magazine to get sexually aroused." Not once. It was more a case of "I want to wear those clothes; I really want to wear those clothes...I'm willing to risk destroying my life to wear those clothes." For sexual arousal? Give me a break. I still contend I was a sensual/sexual person as a "male" and I still am. Why should that change? I had one of the most intense, sexual, female experiences of my life alone in a hot tub without a stitch of clothing on without touching myself anywhere that would normally be considered a sexual part of me. Was that "Atransvestic" fetishism? A hot tub fetish? I don't think so. I believe the clothing acts as a sort of "catalyst" to take me into the female part of my brain, and the loss of "urge" to "crossdress" occured when the catalyst was no longer necessary, the threshold diminished and I could make the crossover on my own.

My 2 cents.
I was putting on dresses before I realy knew what sex was. As I got older my fantasy was to be with girls when dressed. But I didn't have to dress to have the fantasy. I did not fantasize just because I was dressed. Except to fantasize about being a girl. Sex is more satifying when I'm dressed to start with. I only had one girlfriend that I could do that. Which is why I stayed with her for so long in a very bad relationship.
I hope that came out right?