It all started very early in our relationship. It didn’t take long once we started sleeping together that for my S.O. to discover that there were women’s clothes in my closet and panties in my underwear drawer. Her first question was, “is there someone else?” And in truth, yes there was, but she is me.
I didn’t want to hide from her, and I wanted her to know me and what she was getting into by being with me. I told her that sometimes I wore women’s clothes. I had no expectation that we would dress together and be “girls”–even though to just be able to be with someone in this way would be nice. What I am trying to say is that after many years of wrestling with this, I finally had the right reasons to share my predilections (the wrong one being fetish fulfilment or one’s own personal needs).
I didn’t tell her then, however, that I was trans, because I didn’t understand it all that well, and I still don’t. In those days I still thought of it as cross-dressing, as the language we use to describe all of this had not evolved quite so far. She said she needed to process my “confession,” and these were the questions she asked:
“Do you like men?”
No. And apparently most CDs do not. I am not aware of the stats on trans, though I do know that the hormones taken during transition can sometimes change orientation.
“Do you expect me to get involved?”
No, though I don’t want to have to hide it from you. Her response? “No lace, it’s too feminine. No bras, because you don’t have breasts. No wigs, because it’s like a Halloween costume. It still has to be you. I am attracted to you, as a man, not as a woman. Don’t take that away from me.”
Makeup was never in the picture, I have never liked it, not on me. Apart from the work of putting it on and taking it off, I am not sure it makes me look better. I feel the same way about most women. I love natural.
And to her great credit, she did make an effort. She bought me panties on a few occasions, and even a pair of heels. I appreciated the effort, but I felt it pained her, and that she was just doing that to make me feel better. It might have mattered less if it were completely socially acceptable to cross dress. Most likely.
In the end, it felt more comfortable for both of us to pretend it wasn’t there. I began to choose female clothes that were less explicitly female, and we agreed to keep it out of our relationship. That was the first time that she told me that she would be fine for me to go and see someone if I needed to do this. It was so sweet of her. But I never took her up on the offer as sweet as it was. At least not then. Now, yes.
Why not then?
Because my need to dress like a woman isn’t a fetish. I don’t get turned on by it. I just do it because I like how it looks. I like how it makes me feel, inside and out. And while I own skirts and dresses, and don’t got out in them, I do go out all the time in women’s clothes mixed with men’s, and if she knows she usually doesn’t say anything unless it is too obvious other than whether I look good or not. It is a deep part of my sense of self and my self-expression, but I also don’t need the clothes to feel that way. In other words, my non-binary gender identity is there no matter what, but perhaps the clothes do provide comfort.
When I do wear something gendered feminine (pretty much all the time) If it flatters me, she will say so, if it does not, she is scathing, and I don’t wear it again. She has great taste, but I also don’t push it past where her comfort is.
In the end, I did take her up on her offer to “play” outside of the confines of our marriage, but what I have turned to is something very different than the “cross-dressing” play originally envisaged. Instead I have found spiritual sustenance through submission to a very vibrant, intelligent pro-Domme…and while my non-binary nature is a part of what we explore together, it isn’t the main course, or even the appetiser…its just there. And that is the way it should be. Anything else would narcissism.
Beyond Non-Binary 
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