Last week, a reader asked, “Any advice on reaching out to find friends and acquaintances?”
In my youth, my friends and acquaintances came from three sources: kids in my neighborhood, classmates in my schools and local ham radio operators. Since my crossdressing was closeted, I had no friends via crossdressing, although I am sure that one of my classmate friends was a crossdresser.
As a young adult, my friends and acquaintances also came from work. Since I was writing for an international ham radio magazine, I also had friends and acquaintances from the worldwide ham radio community.
My crossdressing came out of the closet as an older adult when I started attending support group meetings and the group’s sponsored outings. As an active member of the support group, I had lots of support group friends and acquaintances including two who had been ham radio acquaintances before they became crossdresser acquaintances. (Small world!) Middle-aged, I began writing this blog and as it became popular, I had even more crossdresser friends and acquaintances.
That was my path for acquiring friends and acquaintances, but my path is not your path.
Joining a support group is still an option if there is a support group in your area. Similarly, you can make friends by attending a crossdresser convention.
The problem is that crossdresser support groups and conventions are becoming scarcer by the hour. Just as the Internet killed off our favorite brick and mortar dress shops and shoe stores, it is also killing off crossdresser support groups and conventions. So what’s a lonely girl to do?
Turn the killer on its head and use Internet social media to find friends and acquaintances.
Google “crossdresser groups” and the Google comes back with over 83 million groups. Fine tune your search for locale, for example, Googling “crossdresser groups connecticut” returns over 741,000 results.
Some of the results will be dead ends, but there is enough active online action that may result in friendships with other crossdressers. Facebook, Meetup, Reddit are some of the online resources to check out. And they are just the tip of the Internet iceberg.
One more thing... There is always the possibility that friends from your boy life can be friends in your girl life. When I came out at work, my co-worker friends were still my friends. No one shunned me; they treated me as if nothing had changed and a few even seemed friendlier! You never know!
Good luck!
And by the way, I want to thank everyone who wished me good luck regarding my surgery tomorrow.
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| Wearing Brooks Brothers |
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| British “Soldiers in Skirts” (circa 1943) ready to entertain the troops |
My thoughts and prayers are with you today sister
ReplyDeleteNETWORK, NETWORK, NETWORK
ReplyDeleteORGANIZE, ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE
If you want a society of like-minded friends, you must be willing to spend TIME as well as MONEY to either create a group or help maintain a group.
You must also be courageous enough to make reasonable risks of making introductions. One risk I made was to reach out to a male soliciting a want ad to purchase breast forms. I introduced myself and assured him that he was not alone. The risk paid off with a long lasting friendship.
You also have to be TOLERANT as well as GRACIOUS-- the moniker of LGBTQIA is quite diverse, and if you happen to be a statistical minority in a local diverse group, then so be it-- DO belong as well contribute.
There is STRENGTH in NUMBERS.
Dont wake up one late day in your life, lamenting: "woulda, coulda, shoulda".
No risk, no reward.
Velma
Good luck and a speedy remount to those four inch heels gurl!!
ReplyDeleteA lot of the friends I've made in recent years have simply been the result of getting of there into friendly spaces and meeting friendly people. I would guess that many of them are gay or queer, some of them (of course) are transmen/transwomen or crossdressers, and some are just allied with the LGBT movement--makeup artists, performers, painters, etc.
ReplyDeleteLike-minded groups are out there. I found my first group by looking in the local LGBT paper. They always have listings of organization meetings. I found my next group from a member of my first group. Then Meetup came along and it wasn't at all hard to find a group. But YOU are the means of finding these groups, they aren't going to find you. You might be nervous or anxious about putting your female self out there, but when you do you'll find a very supportive group of like-minded ladies out there. We don't bite!
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