Over the years I have read extensively about crossdressing and talked with many crossdressers, and have found that there is great diversity among crossdressers, especially in regard to the various reasons that crossdressers engage in crossdressing. There are so many different causes, motives, and end goals. And as I’ve written in other posts, it is hard to divide crossdressers into clear categories with clear labels because there is so much overlap among the different types. Each individual has a different, and sometimes unique set of traits when it comes to their relationship with crossdressing. Setting aside those with gender dysphoria, transsexuals, and those who perform drag, there is still quite a bit of diversity in the remaining group which may be called crossdressers or transvestites.
The addictive or compulsive aspect of crossdressing seems to be nearly universal in this group, (the feeling of not being able to live a happy life without it), but there are some who:
- crossdress for sexual pleasure
- crossdress in order to escape the stresses of life temporarily by escaping into fantasy
- crossdress to let out other emotions and aspects of personality that they usually hide or feel like are stifled because of being men
- crossdress to relax
- crossdress for emotional comfort
Again, there is a great deal of overlap and some crossdress for all of these reasons at once. But interestingly, there are those who strongly claim they do not crossdress for sexual reasons at all, and they wear panties under their suit to work, or throw on a dress when they get home from work, purely for the emotional comfort and peace. It’s hard to argue with them, because I’m in no position to know for sure whether they are telling the truth. They certainly seem to be telling the truth. However, as an aside from this post, it’s good to point out that research and testimony has shown that some crossdressers will say their crossdressing is not sexual, even if crossdressing gives them an erection. Perhaps this is due to thinking that the sexual aspect makes crossdressing immoral or perverted, and that somehow it is more acceptable if it is not sexual. See these posts – Crossdressing without sexual component and Book Recommendation – Living with a Transvestite.
In this article I’d like to explore two related motives for crossdressing which may end up being different descriptions of the same motive. We will look at those who are crossdressing in order to relax and those who are crossdressing in order to have emotional comfort and peace. Most of my posts are about crossdressing for sexual pleasure and for an escape into fantasy, as those have been my main struggles personally. And I’ve already written extensively on crossdressing to let out certain aspects of your personality. Of course, there are certainly many connections between these issues, so some parts of this post may be similar to what I’ve written before, and some of the other motives will still come up in this post. For more on the aspect of crossdressing to let out your true personality, see these posts – Integration and Contentment and How to live as a man and as myself.
I’m convinced that for me personally crossdressing was at least 90% about the sexual pleasure. When I used to crossdress and then masturbate, the desire to crossdress was almost always fully gone after the sexual release. I do think that some small part of crossdressing was about emotional comfort for me and/or gender dysphoria. Since these were such a small part of the picture for me, in this post I am going to lean on what I have learned from books, forums, and discussions with many different crossdressers.
The Phenomenon
What is it that crossdressers of this type say they get out of crossdressing more specifically? Well, some say it makes them feel more like themselves. Some say it makes them feel relaxed, calm and peaceful, a way to rest and unwind. Some say it gives them emotional peace and a happy state of mind. Some say it comforts them and takes away their anxiety, depression, or stress. Some say crossdressing is a security blanket for them. Some say it makes them feel pretty, beautiful, or valuable.
Let me quote some ex-crossdressers that I have talked to about this. One man says that it provided him with emotional comfort. He explains this further by saying:
“For me, perhaps I used it as a way to escape masculinity, a way to de-stress in the same way that having sex is a stress relief… It was a way to temporarily escape life into fantasy.”
Another says that he is drawn to crossdressing when he has a lot of anxiety. In the past crossdressing would relieve some of the anxiety and give him a sense of calmness. He is content being a man but he says that sometimes his social role as a man is difficult. His job requires heavy lifting and getting his hands dirty. Crossdressing in a way provided a sense of stress relief.
A third man says, “That’s not to say that I never got anything sexual out of it. But that was not my primary motivation. Most of the time I didn’t have an erection. My grandmother started saying that I looked like a beautiful girl at the age of 2 and 3. She would hold me and rock me and say it over and over. When I started dressing at 2-3 years old, she very much approved. She lived with us, so this happened on a regular basis. All my life I had a warm, peaceful feeling when I would dress. The closer I could get to looking like a girl, the more peaceful I would feel. It had little to do with escaping masculinity. I liked and still do like being a man and even during the time that I was crossdressing the most, I never wanted to actually become a woman.”
A fourth ex-crossdress says, “About 90% of the time was purely for relaxing and to unwind. Five percent of the time there was a sexual/masturbation attraction to it and the other five percent was something all together different.”
A fifth says, “I know before the age of 18 (when my dressing became sexual) that I used to find extreme comfort in dressing. I was sexually and physically abused and grew up in a broken home, and was bullied and was super shy, so dressing for me became an escape that brought a lot of relief but also brought with it shame and it became compulsive.”
A sixth says that he struggles with depression. When he used to crossdress he was able to manage his depression better, but when he stopped crossdressing, he felt like his depression was worse even while other aspects of his life improved.
Another man claimed that crossdressing not only brought comfort, but also productivity. He was able to feel more relaxed and get a lot of work done on his to do list. In the past, he felt like crossdressing really helped him through his college days to get term papers done.
Others have claimed that crossdressing at night has helped them to sleep much more peacefully and be better rested.
It’s not only the testimonies of crossdressers I know that attest to this motivation. It is psychologists as well. Let me quote Richard F. Docter from his book Transvestites and Transsexuals. He seems to allude that crossdressing that begins as a sexual fetish can mature and develop into a stress-reducing and anxiety reducing behavior.
“Through cross dressing and adoption of the woman’s role, there is the experience of role-relief and reduced anxiety. In place of the earlier fetishism, this behavior becomes a stress management tactic. This is highly reinforcing. Hence, cross dressing and crossgender living become resistant to extinction. 4. For unknown reasons, cross dressing and female role playing generate intense feelings of pleasure and delight unmatched by other sources of satisfaction. They come to occupy a uniquely powerful and persistent set of expectations. 5. There is a gradual “erosion” of masculine identity, perhaps a weakening of the self-system, as cross-gender behavior is rehearsed and reinforced for many years. This process of self-destruction of the masculine identity is especially worthy of more intensive study. A parallel growth of cross-gender identity occurs. 6. Gender reversals, even for short intervals, are associated with a sense of rebirth, self-renewal.”
How many crossdressers are like this? I did some informal research of my own, albeit in a very limited way. I surveyed the men in our prayer group as well as some members of this community who are not Christians. Looking at the results, about 75% of the responders said that they used crossdressing in the past to bring out other elements of their personality that they had stifled. 80% said that they used crossdressing for relief from stress and to escape from life’s pressures temporarily. Around 40-50% of the responders said that crossdressing made them feel more relaxed, rather than more tense (tense as in sexual tension).
(I didn’t survey my friends about this, but I wonder how much of this phenomenon is related to feelings reverting back to childhood. For example, maybe a man crossdresses in order to feel a feminine contact and comfort that he subconsciously associates with his mother or grandmother or other comforting female figure from childhood, especially in cases where the crossdressing is not sexual but only for emotional comfort. This is just speculation. Something I’m wondering about. Probably Freud wrote about something like this somewhere…..)
The Problem
It won’t surprise any of you that I find this behavior problematic. Beyond the issue that it is sin to crossdress according to my Christian faith, I would like to argue that crossdressing for this reason is not healthy and actually can be harmful.
What is the problem? As one friend pointed out to me, using crossdressing for this purpose is self-defeating. It is similar in some ways to a drug addiction. You feel depressed or stressed and you use crossdressing to feel calm, peaceful, and to feel comforted or to escape from stress. But the device you are using to bring comfort also brings confusion, pain, and destruction. So then you go back to the comfort device, in this case crossdressing, to get comfort again. And the cycle keeps going.
Listen to how some ex-crossdressers describe this (some of the same guys as quoted in the former section above):
One says that he used crossdressing to de-stress and escape from masculinity, but that “crossdressing always ends up only adding lots of stress, shame, guilt, and lies.”
A second ex-crossdresser says that crossdressing brings comfort but then you start to become very anxious about your appearance. You want to look more feminine, but you also want to be able to go back to looking like a man. You want both at once, and it drives you crazy. It takes more effort and a longer time to look feminine and then to try to cover up what you did to look more feminine. What you did for comfort ends up giving more anxiety.
The same man adds – “I have found that for a brief moment there seems to a calm respite from the stresses of life, but that calm is like a wisp of air – here and gone. The prevailing and pervading emotion is one of unsettledness, regret, shame, dissatisfaction, insecurity, fear, disgust at my weakness and at seeking pleasure in something so not me and not of God.”
A third person said – “I had to allow lust into my life, with visualizing myself as a woman to escape problems of sibling verbal abuse from my sister. It worked. It helped but it opened up a hornets’ nest and it will for you too. The thought of acting out, with dressing as a woman more important than my marriage, more important than anything else in life. I can make it feel like the only way to heal myself if I allow it to.”
A fourth man says that crossdressing was a coping mechanism. Crossdressing masks the real issues. Crossdressing created more anxiety by the way it controlled his thoughts and actions. He would be consumed with thoughts like – when is my next “fix”, how am I going to keep hiding this from the ones I love, how can I transform my body, what should I eat to stay thin, when can I shop for a new outfit. He adds that it produces a shame cycle. He also views crossdressing as a very selfish behavior that robs from others around him, his spouse, children, and friends. He said he would justify his actions, because he believed he couldn’t go on without crossdressing in his life.
A fifth ex-crossdresser pointed out that while he looked to crossdressing for comfort, it sucked hours and hours of his life away. For something that was supposed to offer refuge and comfort, it was more of an all-consuming addiction. He was constantly needing the clothes and constantly needing the fiction online. For something that was supposed to give comfort, it didn’t do a great job. There was never getting enough of it. He says – “the comfort is sweet for a moment in your mind, but the aftertaste is anything but pleasurable and the burden ceaseless, demanding more and more submission and pursuit of a lie.”
If we combine these reflections together, what do we see? The main problem is that crossdressing is a coping mechanism. These guys, and people in general, have genuine problems and genuine anxieties. It’s important to deal with those pains and anxieties and to try to treat them. But crossdressing is the wrong treatment that doesn’t match the problem. It’s like a doctor giving a patient chemotherapy to address their problem of covid-19. It is the wrong treatment. Crossdressing is the wrong treatment for the anxieties and pains in our lives.
More practically, we can notice that it is the same thing that alcoholics do. They have real pains and struggles in their lives, and they try to deal with those problems by getting drunk. But getting drunk only temporarily takes away the pain, and in the end drinking adds far more pain and potentially a completely destroyed life. Just as drunkenness is never the right treatment for any problem in any person’s life, I truly believe that crossdressing for emotional comfort is never the right treatment for any problem in any person’s life. As the guys above testified above, crossdressing may temporarily give comfort or ease anxiety, but it’s only temporary, just like the relief drunkenness brings is only temporary. Crossdressing doesn’t address the root problem of whatever is causing that person anxiety. It’s only a band-aid. But it’s not even a band-aid, because a band-aid doesn’t help you while also giving you pain, gender confusion, deception, loss of relationships, loss of time, shame, anxiety, stress, fear, insecurity, and regret. A band-aid does not enslave you. But alcoholism and crossdressing do.
What are some other ways that crossdressing causes harm in a person’s life even as they try to use it for comfort? I won’t make this post very long by repeating myself. Please see this post and the posts it links to – https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/summary-reasons-crossdressing-is-sinful-harmful/
The Solution
If the problem with crossdressing is of a similar nature to alcoholism, then maybe the solution is of a similar nature as well. With alcoholism it is important to take radical practical steps to fight the addiction and heal from it, but at the same time, a holistic approach would help an alcoholic to address their underlying depressions, anxieties, fears, or pains that led them to using alcohol to drown their sorrows in the first place. I think the same is true in the case of crossdressing for emotional comfort, that is, using crossdressing as a coping mechanism for some kind of pain or stress in a person’s life. The solution is to take radical steps to break the power of the addiction and to slowly heal from the damage the addiction caused, but also to address the underlying depressions, anxieties, fears, or pains that led you to start using crossdressing as a coping mechanism in the first place.
I’ve written extensively on how to overcome crossdressing addiction. See my posts here – 12 Steps to Stop Crossdressing and All Blog Posts.
In addition to taking steps to overcome the addiction, I would also suggest the following ideas if you have been using crossdressing for emotional comfort:
- Consider seeing a counselor, psychologist, or pastor. It is important to get some help in dismantling an entrenched coping mechanism, and to get help addressing the pain and trauma in your life. Seek out the counsel, care, and comfort from someone who can walk alongside you in this. With a skilled counselor, you may be able to more fully understand the pain and stress you are trying to treat through crossdressing, and look for healthier ways together for you to deal with that pain.
- Find healthy ways to relax and de-stress that do not add new problems, confusion, and pain of their own. Cultivate enjoyable hobbies. Make new friendships. Spend time with your wife and children. Learn to play an instrument or join a sports league. Find ways to serve others and help people around you. Enjoy cooking the fun foods that you like. Take up fun video games. Just be careful to do things in moderation. It’s possible to give up one addiction, and replace it with a new one, whether that is overeating unhealthy foods or becoming addicted to computer games.
- Most importantly, find your emotional comfort, peace of mind and heart, your sense of being valued and loved, and your identity, all in Christ.
One brother says – “I used to have particular items that I would sleep in. They just calmed and soothed me. Helped me to sleep. I lied to myself and thought I “needed” them. Over time I realised that because I was relying on those items I wasn’t relying on God. So as much as I thought it was ok, it actually wasn’t. I was looking for a sense of security – but God IS my ultimate security. I was looking for sleep – but it is God who gives rest.”
Another brother says – “The only way I am truly fulfilled is to know our Maker and this is met through many wholesome ways – healthy relationships, pursuits using God-given gifts and talents, serving others in kindness. These bring a joy and peace I never had in crossdressing.”
Look to the only one who can still your restless heart, the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one who gives us comfort as the Good Shepherd. Jesus is the one who gives us meaning and purpose in our lives. Jesus is the one who gives us security and makes us feel secure. Jesus is the one who brings peace into our lives as the Prince of Peace. Jesus is the one who encourages us when we are afraid. Jesus is the one who never abandons us and commits to stay with us until the end. Jesus is our victorious conqueror who destroys the plans of Satan. At the end of the day, are you going to look to the King of Kings who is full of love for your emotional comfort, or will you look to a piece of fabric?
If you don’t know Jesus yet, you can begin a relationship with him today. If you know him already, then stop looking to crossdressing to meet your needs. Look to Christ instead. He will give you the strength and comfort you need to break away from your addiction.
As an appendix to this post, I’d like to list several Bible passages on this theme. They are helpful for understanding the beautiful things God does for us, and some of them may be helpful to memorize so that when you feel that desire for your coping mechanism, you remember to look to God instead.
Matthew 11:28-30
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Philippians 4:6-7
6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Psalm 4:7 –
7 You have filled my heart with greater joy than when their grain and new wine abound. 8 I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.
John 14:27 –
27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
Isaiah 26:3 –
3 You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you.
Isaiah 41:10 –
10 So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
Psalm 118:5-6 –
5 In my anguish I cried to the Lord, and he answered by setting me free.
6 The Lord is with me; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?
1 Peter 5:7 –
7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
Psalm 139:13-14 –
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
Zephaniah 3:17 –
The Lord your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing.”
Psalm 23 –
1 The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
3 he restores my soul.
He guides me in paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death,a
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the LORD
forever.
Barnabas, thanks so much for such an insightful post. It rings true for me on so many levels. Over the last three years I’ve kept a spiritual journal and I’ve noticed that times of strong crossdressing desires have been linked to periods of stress in home and church life. For me, transforming myself into a woman feels like a way of escaping the demands of life as a man and becoming someone more fun and free than who I usually am. Of course as we all know, it just leads to deeper issues. But certainly for me realising that cross dressing was a place of refuge was huge in seeing progress and being reminded that Christ is our true refuge is key in those times of struggle.
Thank you so much for the comment Norvic. Have you read this post yet? https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/integration-and-contentment/
It may help you on the angle of escaping demands of being a man. I think many of us have fallen into that mentality, that deception really. The reality is that being a woman is not about living a stress free life. It is rather our certain caricature, or false perception of what being a woman means. Actually, more that we slice off one aspect of being a woman, and forget all the hard parts. Men have certain tough pressures in life, but women do too. We are different, to be sure, but life is tough for both. And as you already know, but I’m just agreeing with you, it doesn’t really make sense or help us to relieve the burdens on us as men, by dressing up as women. It’s so interesting to me, and sad, that when people like you or I face those burdens of being a man, we often will not even talk about it with anyone, we won’t look for ways to ease the burdens and make it lighter, we won’t ask for help, and we won’t go to Christ for refuge. We instead keep it all buried and secret, and try to find refuge through CD instead while pretending we have it all together, and that we can bear the burdens just fine.
I’m wondering how much we need to be more vulnerable with our families, and with other men, to ask for help, to deal with those burdens and pressures together. In addition of course to finding stress relief and refuge in Christ.
Thank you so much for the great comment, good discussion!
Hi
I’m not into actually crossdressing, but rather I’m addicted to looking at crossdressers in porn websites and online interactive gay, crossdresser and femboy sex chat. It has, and continues to, ruined my life, my soul and I’m really really scared and anxious about my future, both here on earth in the remainder of my life (I’m 62) but also the next life as I fear God will sayvto me on that last day “Depart from me you wicked perverted disgustingvimpure immoral man, I never knew you”.
In the last 2 years my porn addiction has git much worse, instead of better, after a week’s prayer and fasting for me by my home group members as afted abstaining for a week from online gay and CD porn when I eventually went back to it it intensified and I discovered a free online gay video chat website where I could actually talk live to others on video on my phone and tablet and expose myself as they exposed themselves to me. Once I did this once it just became easier and easier and I indulged in the most disgusting dirty talk as we exposed our bodies to each other while masturbating. I found it hard to live with myself because of the shame but I have become more and more hardened as my conscience has become seared and I just don’t know where this will end, as so far in my 62 years (44 of them as a Christian) I have never physically in person acted out my gay fantasies but I’m afraid it could eventually happen if I cannot overcome this online addiction. I do all of this because of HUGE pain from an unfulfilled life, full of regrets, insecurity and shame that I have never been able to find healing fir, despite going to endless amounts of counselling to therapists and physiatrists over the years, along with lots and lots of deliverance prayer and generatiknal healing prayer etc. I just cannot find any real peace from God which really hurts and frightens me after reading yiur statement below:
“Most importantly, find your emotional comfort, peace of mind and heart, your sense of being valued and loved, and your identity, all in Christ.”
Barry thank you so much for checking in here. I believe we can help you.
First, do you want a life of freedom from this? Ask yourself if you really want it. Because you need to be prepared to do more than simply hope that you will stop giving in. There will be significant practical steps to take, such as immediately getting an internet filter or getting rid of your internet, and joining a recovery group.
Do you know Christ? Fully surrender to him and recommit your life to serving him. Repent of what you have been doing. But really repent. Take steps away from that sin. Put that sin to death. Repentance if its just words is not real repentance. You have to make a choice to live with God instead of a life of bondage to this sexual slavery. Making that choice means putting into place what is necessary to prevent you from falling back into it again.
You cannot overcome your shame and guilt by suddenly doing better. The only one who can take away your shame and guilt is the Lord Jesus Christ. But in him, you can have those taken away. Honor instead of shame, forgiveness instead of guilt, freedom instead of slavery.
Let’s keep talking. We can help you. Join our group – https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/prayer-group/
As much as I look to God, I “fix” my eyes on Him, the holy spirit comforts me but the ultimate and main relationship is with Jesus Christ who gives me rest from all my faults, flaws, emotional, anxiety, shame, guilt, stresses, knowing that I should not have to hide no more secrets, it is when the small stuff is actually bigger than I am (the illusion and delusion) of crossdressing addictions are not treatments. The masking and band aids only make the addiction worse and like it is said in Celebrate Recovery, realize I am not God and yield myself to God. I am reminded of the 8 principles and the long version of the serenity prayer, RECOVERY works.
Amen! Would love to see a longer write up from you on how Celebrate Recovery might be a great program to help other crossdressers, as I have heard good things about it, but not done it.
I crossed a line and acted out several years ago and blurted it out to my wife two years ago. I was on meth and blurted it out to a couple of my sisters and pretty much the whole town knows. I don’t know how I’m going to survive this. I’d take my life, but afraid of hell. Please pray. Thanks
I’d tell you all details, but you wouldn’t want to talk to me
John, who would not want to talk to you? We are here for you. There is always hope in the Lord, whose grace is new every morning, and who commits to loving us even when everyone else abandons us.
To get away from the drugs and the shame from the town, what about moving to a new place and having a fresh start?
Praying for you
Don’t think you would want talk because it involved another person.
I will email you
As I Battle with my own propensity to CD and keep resisting , I see Online there are some Christians who believe it’s alright and think it’s just what’s just meant to be for them and some of them really know the Bible . Underneath it all we know this violates the first commandment -29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[ 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
And many other of God’s rules like The Effeminate .
Even though I struggle and am resisting my transfeminine feelings it makes me so Very Sad so many are ditching their marriages to crossdress & transition .
You know many women these days have their own income and when a husband wants to go this route they will let him go because they know this Qualifies as a Justifiable Divorce because a guy transitioning is abandoning his Marriage Vows so yes This Is Abandonment and Divorse is justifiable in the Whole Protestant Church .As soon as a guy goes this route his wife is being free to Date again and this Entices Her which never would have happened .
I understand it is said crossdressing / Transfeelings are Psychological but I see that as a Huge Understatement .
I mean where is being Saved ? Where is Repentance ? Where is the Feeling of the Holy Spirit’s Presence ? It’s our consciousness , our brain, the harddrive of our soul . The Bible is crystal clear we are in a spiritual battle here on earth for our Soul, for those of us have a propensity to this sin of Self Love , we’ve watered the seeds of trans femininity by crossdressing and as we water these seeds , transgenderism grows and grows more and more all the time ( Like Jack and The Beanstalk ) to a point where we actually believe we were meant have been born female and are a Transwoman .
This looks like a Dark Spiritual Essence Affecting our minds to a place where we Hypnotize Ourselves of a Lie .
Guys , Please Don’t Lose Your Wives because of a Lie .
Hypnotize is a good word for it. At times of falling into this sin, and then repenting afterwards, for many guys it feels like they were in a fog, they feel so awful about doing it afterwards, but in the process of giving in, they just go along with it easily with no thought of consequences.
To answer why was I Hypnotised ? and why do I Resist constantly after falling ?
Because – I am not my own, but belong with body and soul both in life and in death
but belong with body and soul,to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ and He has set me free from all the power of the devil .
The truth most of my life, I Happily accepted a Familiar Female Spirit ( A female demon )
Leviticus 20:6 – And the soul that turneth after such as have familiar spirit , I will even set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people.
I KNOW FOR SURE I ACCEPTED THE COMPANY of a Female Filimilar Spirit like MANY have and they DON”T EVEN KNOW ! and the Holy Spirit convicts me time and time again to resist Her transfeminine feelings .
So I see most guys online just put their toes into the Devil’s crossdressing Water and then over sometimes many many years especially when Senior age arrives get pulled into this water up to their necks and Not Even Having Any Idea they are in the company and presence of a Spirit Being and being one with their Effeminate Evil Familiar Spirit Girl Fixer Identity they just believe it’s just themself .I believe there can be a point of No Return when one’s head finally goes under in this evil Water unless God intervenes with Severe Sickness or a Life Tragedy and one seeks Jesus for help to Repent and they Wake Up .
ps- The Only Hope is in Jesus Christ before one sinks deeply into the Fixer’s Water , one only has One Biological Gender .The God says there is NO entrance to Heaven for an Effeminate man .
Barnabas , do you agree ?
I certainly agree that the only hope in this life is in Jesus. But I don’t agree that all crossdressing and gender dysphoria is caused by demons or the devil. I believe you’ve read my post on that already though. It’s pretty unusual for the Bible to associate demons with causing people to sin. It’s popular among certain types of Christianity today to talk about a demon of pride or a spirit of division, etc. But I don’t really see the Bible teaching that.
James 1:14-15 – 14 but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. 15 Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
Crossdressing ruined my marriage,led to other temptations, ruined relationships with family,friends, and church family. I’m struggling,I just want the Lord to take my life. I miss my wife so bad. Please pray for me. Thank you.
John, please try not to despair. There is hope in Christ. Things seem really dark right now. Cry 0ut with your pain to the Lord (pray Psalm 13 for example), but continue to put your life in his hands. Surrender completely. And ask him to renew you and give you hope and a future.
We are never too far gone for God to forgive us and redeem us in Christ. And we are never so ruined that God can’t totally restore us from the ashes.
Do the work of recovery and repentance. Work on living rightly and getting over your addiction. Work on apologizing to those you’ve hurt. Work on growing deep in your relationship with Christ. As you heal and grow perhaps God will restore many of those ruined relationships, perhaps even your marriage. Whether he does or not, he will be with you, and give you peace in your heart, and even provide you with new friends as well.
Don’t give up. Pour out your cares to Christ, and look to him as your good shepherd.
I’m going to pray for you right now. Please keep communicating.
Thank you for praying. I just don’t have much hope. It feels like I waited too long to repent.
Yes, you should have repented yesterday, last week, or a year ago, etc. But the reality is that in Christ you can still have forgiveness now, it’s never too late for that. And God is a powerful God who is powerful enough to work our good in the midst of the messes we have made for ourselves. Put your trust in him, spend time with his people at church, submit yourself to whatever consequences you are going through with people you have hurt, be humble, look for ways to address those hurts and improve, and most of all, work on yourself, to overcome the addiction and grow in your relationship with God.
It’s really hard now, but you can get through this. Don’t give up.
25 yr marriage over,then my ex threatened to tell about my CD if I went for money. She came over here laughing and making fun of me. Well, she told. Last year while at rehab,my oldest sister and dad walked in my house to help to clean. I didn’t ask them to. They saw heels, several types of hosiery. I was humiliated. I hate to admit I struggle with other thoughts while CD. I fight with prayer and scripture. I think about my wife every waking moment. I told another sister my struggles and it spread through my huge family. I’ve prayed often for God to take my life. I want to die. I can’t stand living alone for another 20,30 years alone. I feel like God gave up on me, because of my temptations and sin I gave into. When they say divorce is one of the hardest things on earth to go through,they are right. I just want God’s peace. Please pray for me. The stress, humiliation, missing my ex, loneliness,fear,dread, depression, anxiety,is more than I can bear. I just wish I could go to sleep and not wake up. I pray and feel no peace. Believe it or not missing my ex is worse than being exposed. I know I was saved at 21 yrs old, but can’t understand why I’ve been so immoral. I just want God’s peace. I’m tormented. Thanks.
John, I’m so sorry for what you are going through. The pain you are experiencing from the shame of exposure and the dissolution of the marriage, is serious. But I plead with you to know and trust that there is hope for you. Do not despair of life. God Almighty is powerful enough to still work for your good in this situation.
Use this as an opportunity to overcome your addiction. Show humility before your family to say, “I was secretly doing those shameful things. I was stuck in addiction.” Explain to them how CD works and how you were stuck in addiction. But how God used the exposure to get you the help you need to overcome the addiction and move beyond it.
I encourage you to join our prayer group to get the help you need to really overcome the addiction and not go back – https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/prayer-group/
Life seems hopeless right now, but use this opportunity to grow closer to God, your creator, to Jesus, your shepherd. I’m not minimizing the pain you are feeling from the loss of your marriage, but we were created for a far more important relationship, for our relationship with God, and sometimes we make an idol out of marriage, thinking we can’t live without it, when in reality God is the only one we can’t live without. Sometimes we have put too much focus on marriage, and put it in the place of God, but only God can fill that hole in our hearts. Maybe God will save your marriage and restore it. Maybe God will provide you with someone else. But whatever happens, even if God does not do those things for you, find your hope and peace and love and joy in Christ.
Reflect on the life of the Apostle Paul in the book of Acts. He thought life was hopeless. He was utterly crushed and ashamed realizing that he was doing the opposite of what was right, and was putting to death God’s people. But God restored him and gave him a life and a future. I trust God will do the same for you.
Take it one day at a time. Don’t give up. Pour your pains out to God each day in prayer, ask for help, and focus on doing good and overcoming your addiction and serving others. Don’t just sit and think about your pain. Focus on keeping busy and helping others, and things will improve.
I will be praying for you!
A quote from a missionary Eric Liddell – “Circumstances may appear to wreck our lives and God’s plans, but God is not helpless among the ruins. God’s love is still working. He comes in and takes the calamity and uses it victoriously, working out His wonderful plan of love.”
Thank you, brother.
Believe in Barnabas and this website John. It really does help every one and all of us understand and are on your side. We have all hit the bottom with crossdressing at sometime. You can grow again.
Thank you for that encouragement Keith. That is so true. Most of us who are here have felt like that at some point (or points). Yet life does continue and can improve again.
I’m very interested in how you at one time felt lovely dressing the way you wanted to. But then decided to abandon it for moral reasons, or religious reasons. I wonder in what way you feel that one’s personal preference in clothes hurts other people in Christ. My Jesus loved all. I believe That Jesus would be with us and love us, no matter if we grew our hair long, or preferred a flowing gown rather than work jeans. I am not sure when Jesus demanded we cut our hair, and wear jeans. I will pray for the answer, but I’ve always felt that Jesus is in my heart, and wants me to dress how I feel comfortable when washing his feet. Long hair, breezy, light robe, scented oils, some eye make up to protect from the sun… dunno. So many confusing messages. Jesus in my heart loves me the way I am. But so many pastors claiming to know Jesus hate me. I don’t think my Jesus hates people that wear clothes that they like to wear.
Thank you Siobhann for the comment. Let me try to help you with your questions. Something is sin not just because of the way we may or may not perceive how it hurts others. It can also be a sin because of God’s commands, or because of rejecting the body God gave us, or because God does not want us to blur the sexes in that way.
You said what you believe about Jesus and what he wants for us. How did you come to those views? Did Jesus tell you personally? The only way we can be sure what Jesus believes is by reading the word of God which records what we know about Jesus. It is a very dangerous thing to make assumptions about what God wants for us, rather than reading God’s Word about what he wants for us. The Bible teaches that the heart is deceitful above all things. It teaches that our hearts are darkened and that we rebel against God. The heart is not the place to search for truth.
The things you mentioned are not necessarily wrong for you to wear. But the point is to go to the Bible for the answers you are looking for. What does God teach in his Word about dressing? There is much more about dressing and clothes in the Bible than you might think.
I am a pastor and I don’t hate you. I love you and wish the best for you!
To start learning more about what the Bible teaches, here are a few posts to read:
https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/deuteronomy-225/
https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/1-corinthians-112-16/
https://healingfromcrossdressing.org/summary-reasons-crossdressing-is-sinful-harmful/
From Rules of Misogyny: # 17. “Men are better at performing femininity than women are because they invented it and it gives them a boner.” Put another way; if you were born with male genitals, you are permanently, biologically barred from anything feminine except “performing femininity”, because no matter how you “feel” about it, it can never be anything but a performance. If you are a male wearing silky clothes and makeup while you do household chores, that is YOUR thing. You know they do make silk boxer shorts too, and in different cultures or situations, men have worn face paint, war paint, theater makeup, whatever, for centuries. But if you are doing it with a mental intention of feeling and appearing female, see rule # 17, above. I’m not rejecting you, but certain behaviors l can and do reject. May God grant us all a healthy level of self-acceptance, and may we continue to grow in his grace.
When CD is used for emotional comfort, why do you think the man chooses CD over something else like alcohol, drugs, porn, gambling? Do you think there’s a propensity to CD already there based on something else inside him? It just seems like you could fill in the CD “blank” with many other coping mechanisms so I wonder why choose that one.
Hi Annie, it’s a great question. I definitely don’t think a boy chooses crossdressing as a coping mechanism. That makes it much different from alcohol. I’m not saying he is necessarily born with it, but it comes about in him in ways he doesn’t choose or understand. That makes it different from alcohol. While you make a choice to drink alcohol for the first time, you know what you are doing and why. With crossdressing, most of us who did it for the first time, whether for emotional comfort, or for other feelings of pleasure (later we learned that were related to sexual arousal), we had no idea why we were doing it for the first time. It came from deep yearnings for the feminine that we didn’t understand, a deep compulsion.
There is so much even researchers do not understand how this works. And more that I don’t understand. But it seems there are some men who use crossdressing for both sexual arousal and emotional comfort, and others where it is mainly just for sexual arousal and yearning to be a woman, and others for whom its mostly just emotional comfort without really sexual arousal. And then those who do so out of great gender dysphoria.
Keep reading here to understand more though, and read my links page. If you want to get a psychological understanding of some of the main types of reasons for crossdressing, here is a good place to start – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blanchard%27s_transsexualism_typology