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June 7, 2017 2:40 pm  #1


New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Hello I just joined and this is the first time posting.  Not sure what I'm doing yet, but just need to reach out.  I've been married 6 years, and in Feb 2016 my husband came out and told me he had gender dysphoria after going through 18 months of counseling. I had no idea what gender dysphoria was but felt we could make things work.

​We have son who will be 4 in September and a daughter who just turned 2 on Easter Sunday.  I've asked him to keep his transgender lifestyle out of the house and away from me and the children until they are old enough to understand and until I could process and wrap my head around it all.

​My husband started out telling me that he had no plans on going 'full time', taking hormones, having sexual reassignment surgery or dressing in front of me and the children.  He did not want to tell anyone, especially his family and was horrified at the prospect of coming out to anyone at work.

​Fast forward a year later. He is out full time at work.  He has told his mother (who like me is not processing this this well) and he is on a low dose of estrogen.   He has shaved his whole body.  Has gotten a woman's hair style (which still looks the same as it did before to me).  Wears woman's jeans, shirts, bras and underwear.  And we are now in couples therapy. 

He is officially now going by Marie at the office. He has created his own FB page for Marie, which he said he created to protect me - but I know that was just a made up excuse.  He has over 150+ friends, I declined his friend request, it was too much for me. 

He has told me that he has no plans to have SRS, which is a relief, but I don't know what the future holds for us.  I'm very much in love, otherwise I would have left a long time ago.  Plus I have two very innocent little ones caught in the middle here.

​Our therapist has provided me with a list of support groups who meet in the downtown Seattle area - but we live an hour outside of town and it's challenging getting to meetings taking place from 7 to 9PM during the weeknight with toddlers.  Besides I don't feel I could stomach sitting through a meeting where there are transgender folks attending. But I could do phone calls and emails when I have a window of time here and there.

​I really am hoping to make our marriage work.  I don't know what that will look like, but I feel like I was blessed with this amazing person for a spouse who doesn't drink / smoke, isn't a gamer, doesn't abuse me or our children verbally or physically - but is someone who is incredibly loving, supportive both emotionally and financially, dependable, trustworthy and loyal to our little family.  The only caveated is, he wants to be a woman.  

​I understand the odds are stacked against us.  After hearing what he has gone through in his life emotionally, almost killing himself - not understanding why.  It took him going to 5 therapist over the course of many many years to finally find one who understand what was going on.  I could never ask him to stop or go back to being what he was and going back on anti-depressants .. but his coming off anti--depressants, doesn't mean I should have to go on them to stay in this relationship.

​He is surrounded by a HUGE support group both inside and outside of work.  I have maybe 3 or 4 people I can talk with about this and none of them understand what I'm going through other than what they have seen play out in the media with Caitlyn Jenner (who my husband met when she came to speak at his company a month ago).  

​I'm hoping to find someone who has been able to stay in a M-to-F Trans relationship and make it work.  I could leave, but I would be looking for someone just like him (sans the trans part).  By leaving and remarrying - I open the door to all kinds of things like what if a new partner puts my ex down in front of my children, or abuses my children or accepts a job in another state - and then the children are torn further away.  I know what I'm dealing with ... I just don't know how to deal with it.  

​I would like to find peace - I have find moments of calm, but I have not found any peace around any of this and really need to in order to stay and make this relationship work.

​Sorry to throw up at everyone's feet.  I'm sure this is nothing new to any of you.  I just would like to be able to talk / chat with someone who understand what it's like to walk in these shoes, rather than respond with, "W O W ... He's what?!  What does that mean?  What are you going to do?"  or my all time favorite, "We support you no matter what decision you make."
 

 

June 7, 2017 3:57 pm  #2


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Deleted

Last edited by Duped (November 11, 2019 3:05 pm)

 

June 7, 2017 9:16 pm  #3


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Hi Roozoo,

I'm sorry you need to be here, but glad you found our little corner of the world.  I hope you can find solace and and outlet here.

I think the thing I'm most struck by is the lists you've made:

He doesn't:
- drink
- smoke
- isn't a gamer
- doesn't abuse me or our children verbally or physically

Then you go on to list things that he is:
- incredibly loving
- supportive both emotionally and financially
- dependable
- trustworthy
- loyal to our little family

I will tell you that I did this same thing - I was always thankful for the things that my ex gay in denial husband wasn't.  He wasn't a drunk or a gambler , a cheater, verbally or physically abusive.  He was always around - he cooked, he cleaned, he was devoted and he was - generally speaking - a nice guy.  And guess what? I.was.miserable.  I kept trying to figure it out - HOW could I be so unhappy with so much?  There are women the world over who would give anything to have what I did, and I wasn't happy.  Maybe I was asking for too much.  After all, I'm not perfect.  I could boil all our issues down to three main problems: his lack of a steady job, our lack of sex/intimacy, and him not taking the lead to be the man of the house.  If only these three things could be solved, we'd be fine!  I figured that if I made myself more attractive/enticing, I could solve the lack of intimacy issue.  Maybe time would solve the other two.  I just had to be patient.  And so I was.  For over a decade and a half.

Despite all I had, and all the thankful that I was for everything I'd been given, there was one huge issue that I couldn't fix.  I mean, if we won the lotto we could solve the money problem.  If enough time passed, he'd be bound to gain some maturity.  But that intimacy - my feelings of being invisible - they weren't going anywhere.  The bottom line is that NONE of these things were the stem of our marital issues - they were just the symptoms.  The real issue was that he didn't love me the way that a man needed to love his wife.  The way where he wants to provide for and protect her from harm.  The way that makes him crave her.  It turns out that that's EVERYTHING.  Everything stems from that.  And without you, you will see a man who's not worried about providing for or protecting  his wife.  And certainly not concerned with physically and emotionally showing his desire and love for her.  And without that, alllll the rest of it meant..... nothing.  If I wasn't cherished and desired, I didn't have what I needed as a woman to make the marriage work.  I even tried to trick myself into thinking that being desired didn't matter - people who cannot express themselves physically still love and marry each other all the time.  Except.... I'M not one of those people, and neither was my husband.  We didn't have that limitation, so there was no reason to place it on ourselves.  It MEANT something that he didn't desire me.  It meant something that I felt lonely even around him.  It meant something that I didn't feel desired and protected and provided for and cherished.  It.meant.everything.

And now I know that.  I am remarried, and SO much happier than I was before.  I still have all the things I had before - a man who doesn't drink, smoke, gamble, abuse me, or cheat.  I still have someone who cooks, cleans, is faithful and present.  But NOW I have someone who cherishes me, and shows me every.single.day.  Someone who's main sexual desire is to attack me - NOT someone who is hung up on their fantasy of being with men, or becoming a woman.  I wanted a man whose main focus was how he felt about me - NOT about how he felt about satisfying his sexual proclivities.  This man revealed that his desire for sex was that he was simply overjoyed to be in the damned room with me, doing whatever I want.

I gave up NOTHING I already had to be with this man.  I still have everything I had before, and more.  SO much more - because I feel like a woman now.  He makes me feel like a goddess - a smart, funny, amazing woman that he's happy chose him out of allll the men in the world I could have had (which is hilarious - but whatever - I'm not telling HIM that!).

You mention that the "only caveat" is that your husband wants to be a woman.  Ummmm, that's a HUGE caveat.  It's not what you signed up for.  Unless you want to be married to a woman and find yourself desiring a lesbian relationship with "her", I'd say you're never going to be happy in this marriage.  No matter how much he doesn't smoke, drink, or abuse you.

Kel


You are not required to set yourself on fire to keep other people warm.
 

June 8, 2017 1:56 am  #4


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

@Duped
Thank you for your candor and I sincerely do appreciate your directness - and yes, it is hard to hear.  Realigning my thinking and bending my mind around having what I thought was a conventional to a non-conventional marriage is not something I have been able to process yet. 

​​I agree with your statement that there is more to these LGBT sexual orientations than the straight spouse initially sees ... and I am very cognoscente that I'm consciously avoiding many things - ostriching if you will, with my head in the sand as I process and work through things on my own time.

​You mentioned your ex was a cross dresser - and yes, they do that for sexual arousal.  In you circumstance, I can completely understand the rational behind your choice to leave the relationship.  Blessing to you for finding out before things went too far down a legally bound path, but it does not negate or ease the pain that comes from investing in a relationship with someone you care deeply. 

​I had no idea as my husband didn't either when we married that he had gender dysphoria.  He was a weight lifter and a very masculine man - but apparently he was doing all this to hide things subconsciously. 

Over the course of the past year he has been sharing snippets of memories/experiences and stories from when he grew up - like the time he was 6 and would play dress up with his little sister.  He said he even would take lingerie from his friend's mothers and hide them and sleep in them at night so he wouldn't get caught.  His step-father even beat him for catching him trying on his mother's clothes once when he was in grade school.  When he was in the 5th grade he prayed to God to make him a girl so he could see what it was like.   

His family is very religious and it was drilled into him that this type of behavior was evil and he carried a great deal of shame around for 40 years.  He never understood why he had these tendencies and for the longest time he thought he might be gay - but he couldn't understand that if he was gay, why was only attracted to woman.  He sought out counselors, psychologists, etc. for years - but none of them he said understood what he was talking about. 

The one relationship he did trust enough to tell completely flipped out and called him a freak.  She even called his mother and told her that her son was gay.  After that happened he shut his feelings everything down and withdrew. He slipped into a deep depression after being laid off about 10 years ago (before we met) and almost drank himself to death. 

He checked himself into rehab and quick drinking, but even then - no one knew what was going on.  He had no idea his drinking and depression were related to being trans - everyone thought it had to do with trauma from his parents divorcing when he was 4 yrs old - along with a compilation of a failed marriage (I'm his 2nd wife), walking away from a successful business, being in an abusive relationship, to being laid off. 

I'm not trying to defend him, but just provide the journey that he/we have been through to get to where I am today - writing on this forum. 

My husband is not gay - he is and always has been attracted to woman, but he considers himself a lesbian trapped in a man's body. It's confusing to me to say the lease.  He has a number of Male-to-Female Trans friends at work who have transitioned and some have remained married.  I don't know how success / happy their marriages are, but I understand they haven't had an easy go of it. 

My husband has offered to put me in touch with some of his trans friend's wives, but I would like to meet and develop my own support group - one which doesn't know my husband and might have an agenda.

​It's difficult to meet folks who have been/or are in my situation.  Less than 1% of the American population is Transgender and of those, 50% have attempted suicide at some point. Most spouses leave within 2 years of their spouse coming out with only 24% remaining married over the long haul.  So yes, the cards are stacked against me.  I've done the research.  I know this is not going to be easy.  I can find plenty of people out there who will tell me to cut and run, but who I'd like to meet are those who have fought and worked to stay and made a success of it.  I have the lives of two amazing children caught in the middle here to boot.   

My apologies for rambling.  Further to your point regarding the seeking other sexual partners ... I was engaged to a man who was heavily involved in S&M, bondage, etc. and hid it all from me.  My spidey senses are pretty sensitive and flags started going off left and right so I cracked into his laptop and phone over the course of many weeks and everything come flooding out and he came home to find locks to the door changed and all his things in garbage bags with print outs of the emails and photos pinned to them. 

My husband (and he will always be my husband to me) reaffirms his love not just verbally by through his actions every day through simple gestures - like bringing me coffee every morning and sending me sweet text messages in the when he gets into work.  He also reassures and shows me he is still attractive to me (even after having two children in my 40's).  So I'm not concerned he is seeking other relationships to satisfy some sexual needs.  If ever that was the case or I even had the slightest hint he was seeking out others for sex - I would not be on this site, but sitting in front of a divorce lawyer.  

​But you are absolutely right - this is a process and I embrace and appreciate any and all input y'all have to share. I don't know what the future holds, but I do know I don't want to leave - and that my life is better with him in it, even though he wants to be seen as a she now. <insert deep sigh here>



 

     Thread Starter
 

June 8, 2017 2:15 am  #5


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Deleted

Last edited by Duped (November 11, 2019 3:04 pm)

 

June 8, 2017 3:30 am  #6


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

@Kel
​Thank You also for the candid and honest feedback.  I can't imagine what that must have been like being married so someone who craved the presence of men over his own wife.  That had to be heart wrenching - but it sounds like you moved on and met an amazing man who fits you like a glove. 

​You make some very valid points and statements which I have uttered myself many times.  I don't want to be married to a woman.  I'm not attracted to woman.  I want to be married to a man and that's what I thought I was doing, then the game changed - like it did for you.

​I have no doubts about my husband's interest and desire for me.  I am very blessed to have someone who cherishes and is passionate about me and shows this through his actions that he physically desires and wants me, this has never been a question or doubt for me.  I've never felt like I needed to doll myself up just to turn his eye or hold his attention.  He has never made me feel like I was never enough either.  

He is also very protective of me and our children as well, even takes me to the gun range for target practice so he can teach me how to handle and fire a gun correctly.  Only thing is he would like to do it wearing a woman's jeans, black concert shirts an sports bra (to anyone who didn't know any better - they wouldn't have a clue he was wearing woman's clothes).  He says his style is 'Rocker / Farm' girl - whatever that is.  I suspect had he been actually born a woman, he would have been pretty butch. 

​To your point though, the transgender caveat is huge - which is why I'm here in the hopes of trying to find positive support from someone who has been able to make their trans relationship work.  I can certainly understand the struggles trying to stay in a relationship where the spouse realizes they are gay ... I couldn't even begin to know what that must have been like to be in situation, but you certainly sound like you found a long term win/win.

As for me, I don't know how long I will be able to stay, but as long as he commits to being part-time where he's able  to be Marie at the office and be my husband and Daddy to our two children at home, then I want to try and make this work as long as I can. 

Had he been interested in having SRS (sexual reassignment surgery), which he adamantly states he has no desire as unlike other trans, he is very happy with his junk.   Also, should he ever go full-time where he dressed as a woman all the time (which he say he is happy to be part-time as long as it means not losing me and our children) ... I could not stay around.  Those are my boundaries.  I've made this very clear to him and in our couples counseling sessions and he acknowledges and respects my ask. 

So that's where we are at. Compromise - something all relationships go through.  As long as your needs are being met and you are happy ... this is what is important.  At this time so far, I am happy.  He is happy.  Both our needs are being met and we are growing together as a couple.  In fact - as odd as it seems, our relationship is stronger now than it was when we married 6 years ago.

​I'm not expecting miracles here.  I can rattle off all the clichés with the best of them - no marriage is perfect.  There are no perfect people. Marriage isn't easy.  Marriage is compromise, etc.. 

I listen to my friends talk about their relationships - how their husband won't help clean around the house or take care of the yard.  How they make a mess of the kitchen when or if they cook.  How they control the checkbook and/or are critical of things they buy or bring into the house.  How they take off fishing / hunting with friends and leave them with the children.  How they don't help with the kids.  Send all their money on crap.  How they don't make enough money.  How they drive crappy cars.  They never fix whatever it is that needs fixing. How they are no longer intimate.  How they never want to spend time with her or his family.  How they don't travel.  How he's not considerate or respectful of her feelings.

​These complaints my friends have, while they are justified and valid concerns / issues in my friend's eyes and impact their marriages sometimes on a daily basis - many to the point where some have gotten divorced.  Looking at it all, their issues seem so mickey mouse to me all of a sudden.  It's being woken up to a situation where you discover a loved one has a terminal illness or has been in a horrific car accident - things suddenly have been put into a completely different perspective as to what constitutes as a critical marriage issue for me now.

​Don't get me wrong, my husband is no saint.  Our yard is a train wreck, he works long hours to provide for our family, he doesn't always flush toilet, etc.  But even with the transgender factor at play, I don't know - I guess I still envoy and love what my husband I have over the relationships my friends have.  

​I know my situation is not like others and the odds are staked against us, but I want to try.  I have hope.  I don't feel trapped like many of my friends feel in their marriages.  

​I've been in enough relationships to know you can't change or fix someone. I don't want to fix or change my husband.  He's been through hell and back and finally has peace.  He's still the same person on the inside as he was when we married.  Doesn't mean that this is a cake walk either.  He's compromising to accommodate me and I'm doing the same by choice because I want to be with him as he wants to be with me.  Some days are easier than others. 

I married an amazing and wonderful person - but he is transgender.  It does and will continue to have an impact on our relationship as long as we are together and even if we separate - because we have children together.   I am just hoping someone on here might have some experience with my circumstance and have some tools they could share which helped them.   
 

Last edited by Roozoo (June 8, 2017 3:58 am)

     Thread Starter
 

June 8, 2017 3:56 am  #7


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

@Duped
That's interesting that your ex was seeking sex with other cds and transexuals.  My husband use to seek the transgender community out and dated many trans woman, all of which lacked intimacy ... after working through it all what he was really doing was seeking out the trans community because he didn't want to really be with the trans woman, he wanted to be them, which is why none of the relationships ever amounted to anything.  Is it possible that maybe your ex is not a cross-dresser, but had gender dysphoria?

On a side note - something that my husband discovered in his research and in talking with one of his co-workers who is also m-to-f trans, that in the late 60's / early 70's doctors thought by giving expectant mothers large doses of estrogen would help prevent miscarriages.  Apparently in a medical study it was discovered that 30% of the children born to mothers who received this treatment many had reproductive issues, inner-sexed and/or transgender. They are known as DES babies (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diethylstilbestrol). 

Which means, this could be classified as a birth defect - in my husband's situation, as it ticks many of the physical issue boxes he had growing up. Like his testicles never dropping, issues as a child which lead him to have to have surgery to urinate, reproductive complications (we had to go through fertility to conceive and he was told he had the sperm count of a 90 year old even).  What more neither of his two sisters have ever been able to have children either.  It's an interesting theory.

With regards to the possibility of him saying / doing anything to keep me around right now - it is possible, as I have heard many trans try to keep their relationships together to support them as they transition.  This could be ... only time will tell.    

 

     Thread Starter
 

June 8, 2017 4:57 am  #8


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Deleted

Last edited by Duped (November 11, 2019 3:04 pm)

 

June 8, 2017 6:23 am  #9


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

I am a DES daughter. Fortunately I had fewer physical effects and ultimately was able to have children. I do not recall ever having been attracted to a woman sexually and the only times I wanted to be male were because boys got to play with active toys and could grow up to become president.

Even if your husband is not "Marie" at home your children are going to notice he is different than other fathers if he ever goes to the beach or pool. Children are constantly looking for differences. They do it naturally and schools emphasize it. (Don't you remember the "Find the different duckie" worksheets?)
Men don't wear tops: they have chest hair. If he's taking estrogen and has reason to wear bras it will   
show. Also there is the possibility that word will get back to them that their dad is "Marie" on the job and their antennae will really shoot up.

I think that it will prove impossible longer term  to keep "Marie" out of their world so the question becomes can you ever become comfortable married to her?. Can you be sexually content?  Not every woman ranks sex as high on the list of marital priorities. What are "Marie's" expectations in the bedroom?

Know that if you do decide that you cannot live with this new reality there are men besides the one you married who possess those same character traits you value and can be loving husbands and step-fathers. 


Try Gardening. It'll keep you grounded.
 

June 8, 2017 6:58 am  #10


Re: New Here - Wife of M-to-F Transgender

Dear Roozoo,

    I am married to a man who declared himself to be transgender in March 2015 (we'd been married 33 years at that time). I have been where you are, asking questions about and seeking answers, explanations, strategies. You know what you're facing, you're say, you just don't know what to do about it.  I get that: I felt the same.  I have gone through the process of shock, disbelief, processing, and deciding what my own "no-go" zone was (in my case it was a public declaration of his transness and publicly dressing as (if he were) a woman).  I have asked myself whether I could stay.  I have tried on the sexual aspect--an intense honeymoon period in which the sex was fantastic and I was living in a contact high from his own.  I have lived through the day to day life, too, of seeing how much my husband's ideas of "woman" resemble male fantasies of femininity rather than actual, breathing, females with actual women's lives, and watching him try to transform himself into this fantasy.  I have seen the process escalate, slow down, develop.  I have experienced the lows and the highs.

    I'm not sure, however, that I'm going to be able to help you.  Or maybe I can.  You say you are here looking for those who can help you stay in your marriage.  But I also see that you are also saying you're wondering how long you can stay, that there are bright lines that if he crosses you won't stay.  Listening to you process, express your doubts, weigh your options, and responding from a place of similar experience--this I can do.  But giving you strategies for staying in your marriage and making it work?  That I can't do.  I can't--and wouldn't even if I could--advise you how to cut yourself into a new pattern that denies your own heterosexuality and asks you to subordinate everything in your life to a new status as wife of a trans person, which from what I've seen is the first requirement for women who stay with their husbands in this situation.  You can find plenty of forums for wives who are willing to do this--I believe Helen Boyd, who wrote "My Husband Betty," maintains a website with a forum.  Many of these forums, however, begin from the premise that you need to adjust yourself to your husband's new status; they are run for the benefit of the transgendered and are part of a support network for the transgendered.  As I understand it, you are looking for something for you (which is why you don't want to meet with the partners of your husband's tg friends).

    In the two months of April and May, ten women with transgender/crossdressing husbands/partners came onto this forum: Scared Spouse, Charity Emet, Secretly Suffering, Katie, Lyonene, Duped, Snookered, Sugar Magnolia, Trunte, Cuddlescat.  That's just two months.  (Between the time I got on, in September 2016, there were others, some of whom posted just once or twice, in response to posts made by me or whatasham or others.)  Many of these ten, like you, have small children.  In all cases, the male partners want the woman to adjust, even to embrace and celebrate, their desire to start living as (if they were) woman. The stories are strikingly similar: the husbands get a sexual high from wearing women's clothes, they start wearing lingerie to bed, they can't understand their partners' reluctance. They insist everything can stay the same--everything except them, of course.  They insist the ARE the same (to which I have learned to say: if that were true, then why do they need to make these changes at all?!)   In all cases the men become self-centered, starting with their insistence that their "need" to be "women" must be accommodated.  And all of the women come here initially wanting to clarify for themselves what they are able to live with.  In contrast to their husbands, the women are concerned first and foremost not with themselves, but with their families.  The men's entitlement is breathtaking.  As is the damage they are wreaking on their wives, their children, and their families.
   I think you should read the posts of all of us on the forum (you can use the search feature to find their threads and posts).  You can add my name to the list above, and that of whatasham, too, who was a great help to me in clarifying things for myself.  If you don't know the work of the two psychologists J. Michael Bailey and Anne Lawrence (a transperson), you should look them up. Bailey's book "The Man Who Would Be Queen" is available for free download.  Your husband fits the psychological profile of an autogynephile, or a "non-homosexual" transsexual--you don't have to read the entire book.  Lawrence's work is also available online; she lives in Seattle, but I believe she no longer accepts new patients, although I believe she does some online counseling.  She would be a fantastic resource for you, as you live in Seattle.  You might also read the blog "My Only Path to Power: Transwidow" and Christine Benevenuto's autobiography "Sex Changes"; it's about her experience with her husband, who now lives as (if he were) a woman.  

    A side point:  Years ago I researched DES (di-ethyl stilbestrol).  You might look up the work of Judith Helfand, herself a DES daughter, and a filmmaker who made two films on DES and synthetic estrogens in our environment.  Her first film was "A Healthy Baby Girl" and her follow up was "Blue Vinyl." 
  
  

Last edited by OutofHisCloset (June 8, 2017 7:06 am)

 

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