Before my sife and I got engaged, I tried to tell her, too. .. - but all that I could say was that I lked to wear women's clothes. She seemed unruffled about it, and so I felt I was safe. But for 30 yrs there were all the good reasons why it wasn't the right time for me to be wearing women's clothes in anyone's presence, , ,

When I finally said- I have to know who I am, and now I think it is safe, and proudly showed myself in my cutest outfit, she screamed in pain and fear and collapsed. I changed clothes, and since then it has been as you say a glacial progress of infinitesimal tolerance.

She can't remember me ever saying anything about this terrible deviance from the norm. Her intense discomfort is a high price for me to pay- I ove her and don't want her to be in pain, esp over me, who is harmless and with whom she wants a close conversational and emotional intimacy. But the tentacles of cis norms embedded since her infany are too strong.

My life is still trying to rationalize cost and benefit of every action that disrupts norms. I know I have a right to exist, but that is all. How to do more than barely survive in the social matrix is a huge challenge!