Tuesday, November 12, 2013

I'm Confused and Astonished

In a recent poll, I asked if you'd meet with people who only knew your femself, as your "birth self."

You overwhelming said yes.  Am I reading this right?  That means almost all of you are out, or ready to be out.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't show up as my male self to, say, the gaming group.  I have gone to clothing swaps in both guises, but there were only one or two people who knew Meg and met the other me.  The rest wouldn't have any reason to look at some random guy (even in a room of 99 women and one man) and say "isn't that Meg?"

Maybe I'm alone, or part of a tiny minority, or I haven't thought it through.

I need to work on this.




7 comments:

  1. Meg -

    It might be better to keep the two sides of you separate, save for a few people who you can trust to know both sides of you. With that being said, you can be "out" to all in certain situations, but let those people who know you as (insert male name here) or Meg figure things out on their own....

    M

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  2. With all due respect I thought that the phrasing of the poll was a bit confusing.
    I work hard to keep my 'Pat' life (limited as it may be) separate from my guy life. I can think of no circumstances when I would want a co-worker, friend, relative, family member (other than my wife) to know of my dressing.
    Even yesterday, while at a business event, one guy that I have know for many years showed some photos on his phone of him being dressed as a blond for Halloween. I could have announced to the people at the table that for Halloween I wore a black wig, black sheath dress, black sheer duster, black hose and heels but I kept quiet.
    Pat

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    Replies
    1. Ah, but if you had a photo on your phone to share?

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  3. As I said when I voted. if I trust someone enough to let them know about Dani (I'm presuming they know Dani is a male crossdresser), why wouldn't I trust them to know male me?

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  4. Good question.

    Being basically androgynous, the male/female lines are seriously blurred for me - I'm recognizable either way. (It has happened...a post is upcoming about that very issue.)

    But since I met the two girls and a guy on the Saratoga & North Creek (my 7th vacation post), who have totally accepted me as female, even in jeans and a sweater, I'm having second thoughts as to whether I'd want to "out myself" to them. We've emailed, and they still refer to me as female. (I'm fairly certain they know I'm TG, but I think I'd prefer to NOT destroy their fem image of me.)

    If I had a definite male appearance, and a fem appearance which didn't look so similar to my male appearance, then I would want to make every effort to keep my male and female identities completely separate.

    I believe this is opposite of how I answered your poll. What a difference a vacation and a few local trips can make!

    Mandy

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  5. i think the poll was too limited to include how we would all feel, I would say as a general principle I want to Paula and Paul pretty separate, there are a very few people who know both, but sometime situations arise. A while back I was tasked with providing a band for our IDAHO event in central Croydon (10th largest town in the UK) I had hoped to recruit from within the LGBT community but fell short so I used my civilian brass band, so what was the bigger risk A/ letting the band meet Paula,B/ letting some of Paula's friends meet Paul or C/ letting everybody down and not turning up at all. I opted to lead the band as the band know me.

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  6. There really aren't any people I know as Annie that don't also know my ugly male brother. A big chunk of my friend base is TS, TG, or CD. There are lots of people who know the brother who will never, if I can help it, know Annie. No need to be out at work, or to the inlaws, or neighbors. I've always maintained a policy of not socializing with coworkers, so that protects me pretty well, and Annie doesn't look enough like her ugly brother to get me identified (read is another matter). My wife, bless her, goes with me either way, and that can get me read, so I have to think about that.

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