Christmas Eve Surprise

Growing up, my father’s family gathered at his sisters’/my aunts’ home for Christmas Eve dinner. With eight uncles and aunts and their children/my cousins and as time passed, my cousins’ children, it was quite a crowd. 

It was always a fun reunion, but it came to an abrupt end about 20 years ago when my aging aunts threw in the towel. It was more than they could handle as they approached their eighties. 

During the ensuing years, my parents and most of my uncles and aunts died. Meanwhile, many of my cousins moved out of state. There was talk of organizing Christmas Eve reunions, but nothing ever came of it. 

However, in the past few years, my out-of-state cousins moved back to Connecticut and around Thanksgiving, my cousin Jack phoned me wondering if I’d help him organize a Christmas Eve reunion to be held at my surviving aunt’s home – just like the good old days. My aunt would not have to lift a finger; her nieces and nephews would put it all together. So I marked my calendar for a Christmas Eve reunion and did my part. 

Although I was close to most of my cousins, none of them knew about Stana. I had not come out to that side of my family and was hesitant to do so because I was the oldest cousin. By default, my cousins looked up to me and I did not want to ruin their image of me... the oldest and more importantly, male cousin.

Coming out to them was on my to-do list and the reunion would provide an opportunity to come out to them all at once. I considered how well coming out to my co-workers had gone even though they were used to knowing my male side for nearly a quarter century. I thought that maybe my family would be just as accepting: it is just old cousin Stan with a greatly improved fashion sense. I thought about it for a few days and decided to do it if my wife was okay with it. 

After 40 years of marriage to a femulator, my wife had seen it all and my Christmas Eve coming out idea was like water off a duck’s back. She said go for it and now came the hard part: deciding what to wear.

Since no one at the reunion had ever seen me en femme, I could wear anything from my vast wardrobe and it would be new to them. But I wanted to wear something I had never wore out before, so that narrowed the selection to about 20 dresses. Considering the frigid weather forecast for Christmas Eve, that eliminated all my short sleeve and sleeveless dresses, so the pickings got slimmer.

I finally settled on a turquoise three-quarter sleeve peplum dress that I purchased from Avon years ago, but had never worn because it was too tight. Now that I was 30 pounds slimmer, it was a perfect fit. I accessorized with my snakeskin Nine West four-inch high heels pearl jewelry. To top it off, I wore my three-quarter-length lynx fake fur from Lane Bryant. I thought I looked very presentable for my unveiling.

My wife and I got in the Subaru and I drove across town to my aunt’s home. Arriving at my aunt’s, I noticed all the vehicles parked in her driveway and on the street in from of her home. I assumed everyone had already arrived, so I would have a big audience for my grand entrance.

We exited my car and walked the short walk up the handicapped ramp to my aunt’s front door, rang the doorbell and someone opened the door to let us in. My wife entered first with me right behind with a nervous smile pasted on my face.

The front room was crowded with aunts, cousins and their kids and as I entered, I heard my cousin Sandra say, “Holy s**t!” Always the sharpest pencil in the box, Sandra recognized me immediately, but it took awhile for the others to get a clue. If my wife had not accompanied me, I think a few would have never figured me out.

All eyes were on me and I heard a couple of wows from the crowd and my Aunt Candace remarked, “Stanley, you are beautiful!”

Cousin Billy took our coats and one by one, each cousin congratulated me with handshakes and hugs (from the guys) and air kisses and hugs from the women. 

The children of my cousins remained clueless. I might have seen them briefly on Christmas Eve 20 or more years ago, but except for some family resemblance, they were unrecognizable to me. However, they were polite and accepted me as the lady with an unusual female name (Stanley). 

No one asked me if I used a female name and everyone called me Stanley, Stan, Stash or Stashu, the latter two being Polish nicknames for Stanley.

Cousin Sandra apologized for her earlier exclamation. She admitted that she only reacted that way because I was the second coming out she had to deal with that day. With that, she said, “Let me introduce you to Jacqueline.” With that, she waved over a pretty woman who I assumed was a neighbor, who I did not recognize or know. 

“Hi Jacqueline. Pleased to meet you.”

“Pleased to meet you too, Stana. You probably know me better as your cousin Jack.”

“OMG,” I thought, “My cousin Jack is a crossdresser, too. But how did he know my femme name?”

“I’m a big fan and read your blog everyday,” he remarked, “Your blog helped me come out to the family today.”

Suddenly, I was distracted because my feet felt like they were entangled in something. And they were entangled in something: the skirt of my nightie. So I untangled my feet and fell back to sleep.

Wearing Venus

Eve is reddy for the holidays

Mindy posing in her favorite Christmas dress near the tree.

My Story and I’m Sticking With It

I was employed three years at my last (and final) employer before I gave away any hints that I was trans. The hint (and it was a big one) was dressing as a businesswoman for the company-sponsored Halloween celebration. I did not dress for laughs (a man in a dress); rather, I dressed as authentically as I could and in the process, convinced some of my co-workers that I was a new female employee.

Three years later, my company did it again and so did I wearing a pinstriped skirt suit, high heels and all the trappings of a businesswoman. I am sure that some of my co-workers who were familiar with my previous Halloween appearance en femme, were starting to wonder about my wardrobe choices. Some made amusing or pointed comments about my costume, but no one ever questioned me about it.

My company did not celebrate Halloween again. Occasionally, a co-worker would show up in costume on October 31, but without the company imprimatur, most people did not costume up.

After waiting nine years for the company to do something again, I took matters into my own hands and showed up at work en femme on Halloween 2013. Since the company was not celebrating Halloween, my co-workers had no reason to suspect I was in costume. Instead, I successfully played the new female hire again. And I became a Halloween tradition by appearing en femme for the next four Halloweens – that’s five consecutive Halloweens in a skirt and heels. 

I assumed by then that some of my co-workers thought that something was up regarding my wardrobe. Little did I know that by the time I retired, nearly all my co-workers assumed I was trans-something or other. This was a revelation to me when after retirement, I attended the company Christmas luncheon en femme.

At that luncheon, I apologized to a number of my friends for giving them the wrong impression that my Halloween appearances were nothing more than a very authentic costume. In each case, my friends admitted that they saw through my ruse and figured that I was trans-something! (That framed photo on my desk of me en femme probably did not help keep my secret identity a secret!)

Thing is that by the time of my five consecutive appearances in businesswoman drag, I did not care what people thought. But I did find it amazing that no one ever asked me about it. If they had, I would have told them the truth, but it never happened. 

Another thing is that if I knew that everyone knew, I would have found more opportunities to show-up at work as a businesswoman, for example, on other holidays, my birthday, days of the month ending in the letter Y, etc.

And so it goes.

Wearing Reiss

  

Pat Henry femulating in the 1968 film Lady in Cement.

Done That

Diana’s post on Wednesday reminded me that Tuesday was National Coming Out Day. 

I missed another one! 

It is not an entry on my calendar because I don’t have to worry about coming out any longer. I am out to just about everyone I know (and don’t know). The only stragglers are some aunts and first cousins and the Internet savvy ones probably know if they ever Googled our last name because my “secret identity” comes up in the Google search results. (Note to cousins: You can tell me you know. I won‘t be embarrassed.)

C'est la vie!

One truth I discovered when coming out is that you are likely to have better reactions if you do it yourself rather than via a second party. I have come out to hundreds of people and have had no negative reactions (to my face – who knows what goes on behind my back?) The worst reaction was from an old friend who remarked, “Why would anyone choose to be a woman?”

When you use an intermediary, the reactions may not be so positive. My wife did a lot of the coming out to her family and friends. As a result, one long-time girlfriend ended her relationship with my wife over it. My in-laws, in general, were not supportive (oddly, the wife of my very non-supportive brother-in-law was very supportive). 

If I came out to them myself, I wonder if their reactions would have been better?

I was not always so free about revealing my secret identity. In the past, I took baby steps when I came out, carefully picking and choosing the people I considered coming out to and mulling over whether to do it or not.

Early on, I only came out to females – never to males. It was easy to come out to females because I was telling them that I am on their team. Men were not so easy. Just encountering men when I was en femme used to give me pause; coming out to a man was unthinkable. But I finally reached a point when I had to come out to males.

When I decided to attend a ham radio convention as a woman, I felt obligated to inform the officers and directors of the organization whose booth I would be staffing at the convention (I was an officer and director myself). 

I composed a coming out letter. That was the easy part. Sending it was the hard part.

I recall copying that letter into the text of an email, adding all the email addresses into the To: field and then hesitating to click on the Send button for hours... over three hours. 

I finally realized that my hesitancy was ridiculous – I had to come out to these people or chuck my plans to attend the convention as a woman. So I clicked on the Send button and waited for the reaction.

The response was anti-climatic. I received 100% support from the people who received my email. Not a discouraging word was heard.

And so it goes.

Wearing Venus

Greg Kean femulating in a 1993 episode of television’s Designing Women.

Coming out is hard

When I decided to attend Hamvention as a woman, I felt obligated to inform the officers and directors of the organization whose booth I would be staffing at the convention (I was an officer and director myself). I also felt obligated to inform my publisher and editor, who published my ham radio books and articles. 

I composed a coming out letter. That was the easy part. Sending it was the hard part.

I recall copying that letter into the text of an email, adding all the email addresses into the To: field and then hesitating to click on the Send button for hours... over three hours. 

I finally realized that my hesitancy was ridiculous – I had to come out to these people or chuck my plans to attend the convention as a woman. So I clicked on the Send button and waited for the reaction.

I was shocked by the response. Not a discouraging word, just lots of support from my publisher, editor and fellow officers and directors. 

What a relief! And that episode empowered me to come out to anyone. 

mytransgenderdate.com recently did a study with their user base about their coming out experience.

They discovered some interesting findings.

Transwomen are three times more likely to come out than transmen

The majority of transwomen come out before age 30

Many transmen don’t think that they need to come out

Friends and mothers are favorite persons to come out to first

26% of transwomen said they lost their job or a job opportunity as a result of coming out

Only 6% of transwomen declare regretting coming out

Click here to access the whole study (methodology, numbers, charts) and an accompanying article.

Wearing Paige

Frank Puglia femulating in the 1937 film Bulldog Drummond’s Revenge.

Quietly Outing Myself

Actions speak louder than words

The only time I deliberately outed myself was when I decided to attend Hamvention as a woman after becoming a “ham radio legend” as a man. As I had at past Hamventions, I would be representing two ham radio organizations (one a national organization, the other an international organization), so I felt that it was necessary to inform the leaders of each organization of my plans.

In retrospect, I should not have been surprised that they accepted the news and were extremely supportive. They had known me for many years and probably assumed that the only thing that would change would be a change of clothes.

At my day job, I showed up at work as a professional woman seven Halloweens (the last five Halloweens consecutively). Each time, I went all out and never appeared as a “man in a dress.”

First time, I assumed that my co-workers gave me the benefit of the doubt for my excellent femulation (his wife probably assisted in his transformation). The second through seventh Halloweens, I assumed that my co-workers suspected that there might be more to it than my wife’s skills. In fact, my wife never assisted in my femulations except to purchase some “girly gifts” and to offer me advice (“Your skirts too short!”)

All benefits of doubt were off when post-retirement, I was invited to my former employer’s Christmas party and showed up en femme. 

I never outed myself to any co-worker except my supervisor, manager and Human Resources and that was just to cover my derriere in case my ham radio world somehow got mixed up with my day job. 

If a co-worker ever asked me what was going on, I would have told them, but no one ever asked. Even the framed photo on my desk of me in office girl drag (photo above) did not move anyone to ask. But I think I did not give my co-workers enough credit – I believe they figured me out, but respected me and did not want to mention (the obvious?).

Post-retirement, I had a girl’s night out with my former supervisor, manager and the CEO’s executive assistant, Jackie. As I mentioned above, I had previously came out to my supervisor and manager, but not to Jackie, who was a big fan of my Halloween femulations. So while we were chatting at the restaurant, I asked Jackie if she knew I was trans and her response was “Of course!”

And so it goes.

Wearing Peter Do

Charles Hawtrey and Albert Burton femulating in the 1939 British film Jail Birds.

Coming Out Unintentionally

By Lisa

Do the people in your life know that you identify as CD or TG or something else outside the traditional binary? How do they know? Did you disclose it to them or did you unintentionally out yourself? Those questions are important if you are still partially in the closet as I am.

Coming out unintentionally came to mind when I was watching the excellent documentary Our Dad, Danielle, which played at the 2021 Vail Film Festival (23-26 September 2021). 

Danielle came out unintentionally to her daughter, Sarah, on a day when Danielle thought everyone in the family was away on a shopping trip. She decided to lounge in the family’s swimming pool in her swimsuit, but her daughter was in an upstairs bedroom with the blinds open and saw her dad and couldn’t make sense of it. 

Why would her dad wear a woman’s swimsuit? Had he simply looked for the nearest suit because his own swimsuit wasn’t available? It was confusing to her, so she asked her mother about it. Danielle’s wife, Becky, thereupon insisted to Danielle that she come clean.

That part brought back a memory when something similar happened to me. It also was very real to me because I am blessed with access to a swimming pool too and love to go there as Lisa (I also love to wear a sarong because I think it looks simply lovely).

My children are all grown and because I have a “don’t ask, don’t tell” relationship with my wife, when she is at work over the weekend, it is time for Lisa to be out. On one such a Saturday I was dressed casually with no makeup or wig making myself some lunch in the kitchen when my 28-year-old daughter walked into the room. It was her house too growing up and she was looking for something, so she thought nothing of simply walking in. She took one look at me and the only word she could utter was, “What?!” Whereupon I said, “Give me a second…” and I rushed out of the room to change into my costume (guy clothes). 

When I reappeared, I sat her down and explained that I was TG. She was gobsmacked because she had no idea that her dad identified as a woman. I told her that when she was a little over five years old, she had walked into the closet I shared with my wife and had seen me in a bra, panties and stockings. She didn’t remember that happening, which I found fascinating because it obviously meant that she had no strong feelings associated with seeing me in women’s undergarments. It was not in her long-term memory. Whereas I had very strong feelings being discovered by her and it was indelibly stamped in my own memory! 

It may be that the incident occurred prior to the point when she start noticing gender differences. In any case, as we talked I learned that the most important question for her was whether my wife knew about my gender dysphoria. I assured her that my wife knew, but only as much as my wife was willing to know. 

And my daughter wanted to know whether my sons knew. They did not and still might not know except that I felt compelled to tell them so that they had a personal stake in defending TG rights when a “bathroom bill” was introduced in our state legislature.

From the day of that outing until now, my daughter has been my staunchest ally and supporter. She allows me to share with her some of my experiences and feelings about being Lisa. She knows Lisa is fundamentally who I am. 

Kids today are so much more aware of trans issues and they fully accept that some people have gender dysphoria. Still, I have learned to keep my filters intact with her. A daughter is still a daughter, even if she is an ally. There are some things that are just too personal, particularly between a father and daughter, to be said or shared. I believe that is true for any relationship: an ally of mine (and I have some others) should only know what someone in that particular type of relationship would generally know about me.

How about you? Have you inadvertently been outed? If so, what did you do? Was it ultimately a positive or a negative experience? 

My hope is that you benefited from someone important in your life knowing, as I did – even if it was unplanned!

Wearing Elisabetta Franchi

Fernand Raynaud femulating in the 1959 French film La Marraine De Charley (another rendition of Charley’s Aunt)

Coming Out to a Male

Ready to meet my male friends for
the first time as a woman (May 2010)

Eleven years ago, I came out to a friend, who I had known for over 15 years and lived 2500 miles away. Except for one or two face-to-face encounters at ham radio conferences each year, all our communications were by e-mail. The next conference I attended would be en femme and I wanted to alert him beforehand.

In anticipation of coming out, I composed a 500-word letter of explanation. I copied the words into a blank e-mail, made a few changes, then I stared at the Send button for a few hours. I did not actually stare at the Send button all that time, but for over three hours, I did consider whether or not to send the e-mail.

It was a tough decision. In the past, I have come out to friends and acquaintances who have known me for a long or short time, but all of them were women. I found it very easy to come out to women. I guess because I am telling them that I am on their team.

Men were not so easy. Just encountering men when I was en femme gave me pause; coming out to a man was unthinkable. My friend would be the first male friend or acquaintance I would come out to.

I finally realized that I had to tell him, so I hit the Send button and girded myself for his reply. I was so worried about his response that I did not check my e-mails the rest of the afternoon. Finally, after dinner, I looked for his reply, found it and opened it.

He wrote, “Thank you for the e-mail. I am sure it was hard to send. But rest assured, you have my respect and support. I think it is best that a person be true to themselves, and you are doing just that. You go girl!”

He floored me with “You go girl!” Now, that’s a real friend!

By the way, in the ensuing 11 years, my coming outs have had such good outcomes that I now think nothing of coming out to males, as well as females from my past. Some people are surprised, some not so much, but either way, I have never had a negative reaction. On the contrary, most reactions are very positive just like my friend above.

Wearing Veronica Beard

Victor McDoom

No More Closets

I was in the closet for a very long time.

Although my interests in feminine things go back to my earliest memories, I did not take up crossdressing until I was 12-years-old. But once I began, I crossdressed at every opportunity, typically whenever I found myself alone at home.

When I was 19, I reached my tipping point and had to let Stana out of the closet. So I dressed en femme on Halloween despite the fact that I had nowhere to go. Unlike today, where there is a Halloween event everywhere you turn, back in the late-1970s, there was not much Halloween-wise for a young adult. I had not been invited to any Halloween parties (I didn't even know of any Halloween parties) and I was too young to go to any bar that might be celebrating Halloween. So, Mom let her “daughter” borrow the car and I visited some friends and relatives to “trick or treat.” (How desperate is that?)

Post-Halloween, I was back in the closet honing my femulating skills while waiting for next year’s Halloween party invitations. I never went out en femme to trick or treat again, but I did get a few party invitations over the years. 

I always attended the parties dressed as a woman, not as a woman wearing a woman’s costume. Invariably, some party-goer would wonder why I wasn’t wearing a costume and I would explain to their astonishment that I was in costume. Post-Halloween, I would be back in the closet again, but at least I realized that all the practice in the closet was not for naught.

Online (via CompuServe’s Genderline), I discovered and joined a local support group in the early 1980s. Now, I was able to get out of the house en femme on days besides the last day of months beginning with the letter O. I attended meetings once or twice per month, always dressing at home and driving to the meeting hall 25 miles away. 

On occasion, the support group sponsored outings – usually dinners at local restaurants, which sheltered us in a private room so we would not to mix with the civilians. I always attended, but being a rebel, I made a point of using the public ladies’ restroom instead of the private restroom that had been assigned to us.

I wanted more and began attending trans conventions, which gave me the opportunity to have the run of a whole hotel for a long weekend en femme. But I realized that I was still in the closet. I just had more closet-space: in my home, in my support group’s meeting places and in trans convention hotels.

I still wanted more, so I became a little more adventurous. On my way to support group meetings, I would stop off to buy a refreshment at a convenience store or fast food joint. Amazingly, no one seemed to notice or care that I was en femme. I was passing or at least, I was accepted and that emboldened me to do more. 

It took 55 years, but I finally summoned up enough courage to go out in public en femme. I decided to make that leap by going to the mall. I dressed en femme, drove to the mall, arrived just as it opened and sat in my car for a half hour trying to muster the courage to exit the car and walk across the parking lot to the mall entrance.

I finally pushed myself and did it and spent the better part of day at the mall having the time of my life. Some people read me, but it was not the end of the world and once I got a taste of the world en femme, I wanted more. 

Subsequently, I picked my days and spent them en femme, shopping, dining, being entertained, enjoying the arts, etc., etc. and I loved it, doing what other women did when they were out.

It all felt so natural to me. I was always feminine. As I have written here before, I was not a female trapped in a male body, rather I was me trapped by society’s expectations of what a male was supposed to be. The “problem” was that I preferred to fulfill society’s expectations of what a woman was supposed to be. 

Finally, I realized I was a woman, who happened to have a male body, but I was not going to let that little handicap hinder me from being the best woman I could be.

And so it goes.

Cavet Emptor: Today’s post originally appeared here in 2011. I rewrote it and reposted it in 2015 and I rewrote it once again and reposted it today.

Wearing father and son outfits from Boston Proper

Mark McKinney femulating in The Kids in the Hall’s 1996 film Brain Candy.
You can view the film on YouTube.

Like Mother, Like Daughter

Mom would have been 100 years old today. 

She raised my sister and I in the 1950s, while my Dad worked two jobs to finance our raising. With my male role model out of the picture (or out of focus) most of the time, Mom became my role model and as a result, instead of raising a son and a daughter, she raised two daughters.

The older daughter (me) was her favorite and received more attention; I was babied, pampered and spoiled, whereas my sister often had to fend for herself. As a result, growing up under Mom's tutelage, I turned out to be very feminine and learned to act like the lady she was.

A lot of us femulate our mothers to some degree. I, for one, favor styles that my mother would wear. 
For example, Mom loved high heels, always wore them when she went out and she owned a closet full. Like mother, like daughter, I love high heels, always wear them when I go out and I own a closet full, too.

I resemble my Mom’s side of the family, too, and I look just like her. (My sister recently remarked how much I resemble Mom. Interestingly, my sister has never seen me in girl mode and she was looking at a boy mode photo when she made that comment.) 

And my resemblance to Mom went beyond facial features. She had shapely legs. When she worked in an office before she married, her nickname was "Legs." Again like mother, like daughter, I inherited Mom's legs and a transman once dubbed me "Leggy.” 

I love being my mother's daughter and I guess I have become my mother in many ways.

Wearing Max Mara coat, Nanushka dress and Zimmermann booties

Professional femulator Pavel Arambula

Trolling Goldman Sachs Coming Out

The trolls had a field day with The New York Times article I mentioned here in my previous post, Coming Out at Goldman Sachs.

Here is a rather despicable post from a troll, who is green-eyed jealous of Maeve's salary and uses that to attack her. You can find more vile comments following the Times article.

Thank you, Velma, for the heads-up!

Wearing Venus.

Image from a penny arcade card, circa 1942