Tri-ess

[Krista]

I submitted my registration this morning for Tri-ess National...it appears that my closest local chapter may be in Arizona or Utah (I don't see a Chapter listing for Colorado on the site...) May I ask if anyone else is a member - and if so - what has been your experience with this organization? Thanks!

[KimberlyS]

I was a member of Tri-Ess for a couple of years. They use to have a group in Denver, in fact I attended an event there with my ex. It was a couples learning weekend, but can not remember the name of it. Over all they were a good organization. Their down side IMHO is their narrow focus of married crossdressers. This along with the fact that the world is more open and easier for us CDers to get out and about and shop.

kimberlys cd
joe in a skirt

[Hanna]

Krista,
I don't much about the group. Closest Tri-ess to me is a 9 hour drive(Atlanta).
I have talked quite a bit to Rhonda, their membership person, he/she, seems very nice and I'd love to go for a weekend. They have montly meetings, plan different events. Their group seems to have an average attendence of about 7-15 cd's.
They usually plan for Thurs, Fri, and Sat night dinner, and an optional Sun breakfast. And a Sat event, show, shopping, tour.

[Jean Ann]

I am still interested in forming a Tri Ess
Chapter or similar in the Texas Panhandle Rolling Plains area l,
Western Oklahoma area
Any girls out here

Jean Ann

[Kelly]

I have not lived in or around Denver for a really really longgggg time. A quick search reveals

https://giccolorado.org/the-gic/resourc ... -colorado/

None of these is a tri-ess chapter, but they do appear to offer similar programs/support-networks.

Have you checked out any of these?

Kelly

[Shelby]

I was a member of Tri-Ess for a couple of years. They use to have a group in Denver, in fact I attended an event there with my ex. It was a couples learning weekend, but can not remember the name of it. Over all they were a good organization. Their down side IMHO is their narrow focus of married crossdressers. This along with the fact that the world is more open and easier for us CDers to get out and about and shop.

kimberlys cd
joe in a skirt

Kimberly would you mind explaining more about their views of married CDers?

[Jean Ann]

I think the Tri Ess frame work might work for me to organize
a group . The basic plan is good . I think it would be fun
to have such a group in our area . Maybe meet for dinner
Every month or so . Hope some more area girls feel the same

J A S

[Wesley]

The Oklahoma city area had a decent Tri-ess group back in the early 90's. I attended in my early 30's with my second wife to help give her more insight into crossdressing. (she never had a problem and embraced it.) But I wanted her to understand there were other men who enjoyed wearing women's clothing and were straight. This is a central concept of Tri-ess, to emphasize heterosexual crossdressing. At one time, nationwide there were something like 40 or 50 groups. Now there are 12.

It was a great group, and we made a few friends at the time.

I am going to say this despite how unpopular it may be. The thing that killed the OKC group and many other local Tri-ess groups was essentially that it was co-opted by transexuals. This is not to say that I have any problem with someone being Trans. My complaint was that rather than starting an Oklahoma city transexual group, a group of people co-opted and destroyed the crossdressing group.

It is important to note there is a difference between heterosexual crossdressers, who just want to dress in essentially womens clothing that have no intention of changing their sex and someone who identifies as Transgender and desires to transition. I have no doubt someone will remind me of the old line about "what is the difference between a crossdresser and transgender? Answer: about two years.

But I also know this is not the rule. Irrespective of what a person elects to ultimately do, the community should at least respect those who do not choose to become transgender. I will admit, I considered the idea, and I have no desire to transition, or to undergo SRS. I am quite contented to be a guy who occasionally wears women's clothing. Conversely, I would like to associate with people who share that same ideal. I have no desire to talk about transitioning, or hormone levels etc.

I toyed briefly with the idea of restarting the OKC chapter, but right I was met with outright hostility. I eventually gave up on the idea. Which is a shame because for a community that demands tolerance, sometimes they offer little.

[KimberlyS]

Wesley I will agree that in other groups I hard about there were struggles between the heterosexual crossdressers couples and the trans ones. When I was a member and interacting with the groups there also seemed to be a push from the top leadership that it was ok to have the trans participating but they could not be part of the leadership. From what I was hearing some of the groups were loosing membership because of this. So between this conflict going on and CDing/Transgender being more acceptable it made it hard to get and keep membership. I would have been more active, but my closest group was 5 hours away and the next closest was 12 hours. We made it once to each group for a function, but my ex was struggling big time with my cding and a lot of other things in life, so I just did not renew my membership.

kimberlys

[Anne Bonny]

I believe we are a community who share the spectrum of something that runs from one extreme...to the other. We are all in this together. There are sisters here a whole bunch of them who are Transexual...I am someone who is and who always will be essentially someone who would be categorized as at best a part time non-op trans who sways back and forth. I can say I have read on this site postings from many who are somewhere else along the spectrum. I have personally received tremendous help and advice from the transexuals who are here and I look up to them because that is how I feel toward them, I am where I am, they are where they are but I have never felt that they did not respect me and I have never felt they were trying to lead me anywhere but to self acceptance, I have always felt respected for who I am on this site.

I do not believe there should be a division because I really do believe we share the same spectrum which runs through all of us.

I would be for founding an organization that is open to everyone..or perhaps for working for change toward that inside of Tri-ess if it does not now exist. we are all in this together and we should all be respected for who we happen to be uniquely as we live together with whatever variation we have on our little segment of this spectrum.

[Wesley]

I believe we are a community who share the spectrum of something that runs from one extreme...to the other.

Anne,
I understand what you are saying, but after considerable thought on the matter allow me to express why I disagree with you. Essentially it comes down to to the fact that the evolving paradigm of transgenderism has taken it upon itself to delegitimize and suppress the concept of crossdressing. In this case, the actions of many have caused the failure of the largest crossdressing support groups in the nation.

As some of you may recall, I had posted an inquiry about restarting an Oklahoma city TRI-ESS chapter. I raised the issue here and in other venues as well. In just about every thread the results were similar. Essentially condescension based on the idea that "well why do you need a crossdressing group when we have these wonderful transgender groups?"

Ok, simple.
-Some of us have no desire to change our sex or undergo significant surgery.
-Some of us have no desire to discuss transitioning or the issues regarding changing sex
-Some of us have no desire to discuss Hormone therapy or results, or SRS surgeons
-Most importantly, TRI-ESS was intentionally family friendly. We could take wives and or other family members to help reassure them we were not gay, nor wanting to become women. That difference alone should explain the difference between Crossdressing support and Transgender support.
-As a result, there are effectively NO support organizations for crossdressers. (except TRI-ESS which has greatly reduced the number of chapters.)

For a number of crossdressers that "discovered" crossdressing at adolescence, I suspect that we had made peace with ourselves and the idea that we could be contented with crossdressing without subscribing to the idea that we could or should change gender.

Additionally, when you subscribe to the spectrum model, you are by default open to the idea that you can escalate your own level of gender dysphoria*. I do not intend that as any sort of an insult. But to point out that once you open yourself up to the idea that you can be more feminine, via actions outside of crossdressing, over time you internalize and escalate to achieve the same level of satisfaction. With an element of sexual fetishism and masturbation, the effect is more pronounced and rapid.

My observation seems self evident, but apparently not to those who believe the difference between a crossdresser and transgender is about 2 years.

*I intentionally used the term dysphoria here, as I do sense, in reading the multitudes of posts here, that many are struggling on some level with acceptance of their crossdressing. Non acceptance of self is by definition a dysphoria. To clarify however, I am NOT saying being transgender or crossdressing is of necessity a dysphoria.

[Anne Bonny]

Socrates never set anything down in writing because he believed the speaker is then there to instantly clarify his ideas. What I meant by spectrum is that we exist wherever we are on it, those who over time come to realize transition is right or wrong are where they happen to be. I have accepted who I am, I have no problem with who I am. I have really thought through all of these things for years and I have determined that transition would be a wrong move for myself. If I were feeling female most of the time, If I were living full time as a woman and found myself to be happiest there ...I would exist toward that end of the spectrum, but I am just not there. On balance I find myself on the male side my estimate is that I am probably 35 to 45% in the female range meaning I am 55 to 65% in the male range. Just a guess, but be it conditioning and socialization being 61 (later in life) the fact that I am really alright without venturing out into public but that I do dress almost partly every day it....tells me this. I am heterosexual too. I have tried in the past to dress every day but after several days I hit a wall causing me to question myself...I begin to feel silly and fall back onto the male side of things - conditioning and socialization?? I was raised and lived and worked under the expectations placed upon me by everyone around me so who knows. But I believe I exist in a fixed place on this spectrum and always will. There are some who will find they should transition once they sort everything out so that they are fixed on that end of the spectrum. Anyway this is how I think about the spectrum I do not see it as a sliding scale I believe we are born wherever we are. I have been this way my entire life I only discovered this when I was about 8-9.

[Wesley]

I have tried in the past to dress every day but after several days I hit a wall causing me to question myself...I begin to feel silly and fall back onto the male side of things - conditioning and socialization??

In my case, the idea of being a crossdresser was totally accepted in my mind by high school graduation. I had been given enough information, (in the form of a copy of Dr. David Reuben's Everything you always wanted to know about sex but were afraid to ask* when I hit puberty in the mid 1970's) to realize that the behavior, while not mainstream was in and of itself harmless. At the same time, I realized the behavior was not likely to change. I can recall going through "purging," but a single time thanks to that revelation.

Seeking out Tri-ess in the 1990's was more for my wife at the time, but also proved helpful for me, in that I had not ever had the opportunity to meet or be around other crossdressers. Tri-ess was of great value in this respect alone. For me, meeting other crossdressers who were stable in their position (as crossdressers and as opposed to transgender) was self affirming and empowering.

I really bemoan the loss of such groups for younger people who may be uncertain of their identity as being crossdressers or transexual. All too often, I find transexual individuals who subscribe to the idea that, "all crossdressers are actually transgender and just don't realize it yet", have an agenda. Such agenda's should be recognized for what they are, self serving and potentially damaging.

[Anne Bonny]

In my case I discovered this at the age of 8 or 9...1965-66! Maybe that is when I first became aware that I was like this. Obviously at that age I had absolutely no clue about any of this. When were the first home computers? 1980? and when had the internet grown so explosively that people were on it and were beginning to create the first crossdressing related discussion sites? I believe I came across my first site in the late 1990's! I was by this time 39 to 40 years of age and the site was very much like this one...it went belly up after several years sadly. So, roughly 30 years of being in a closeted situation...thinking I am unique...I have this strange fascination and feel very feminine and enjoying and wanting to dress in women's clothing.... I got married in 1991 did I tell my wife? Absolutely not! I thought once I was in a marriage it would all go away...that is how naive I was...it was an honest mistake, 7 years in I had to tell my wife and fortunately we survived, we loved each other, she understood it was something I could not help so there was a degree of tolerance and I of course stayed within the rules she desired me to abide by...not around our sons, not in public, and of course close the blinds. I also knew when she would be more open and able to tolerate my dressing for a little while.

Any way a lot has happened and today at 61 I am light years from where I used to be. I do know that having my ears pierced was huge and allowing my hair to grow out long enough to achieve a real feminine styling as in my avitar photo is wonderful, skill with and having my own make up, being at my correct weight and doing all the usual grooming all now just part of who I am. Well I could go on and on...but I do believe that I am where I should be, cannot see full timing, hormones, or any kind of body altering intervention...that is not where I am on the spectrum.

Tri-ess may be a viable and wonderful social club but only for those who live in our largest cities nationwide and they are probably pre internet in origin? hum appear to be correct: Tri-Ess was founded in 1976 by the merging of two existing groups for crossdressers, Mamselle, a group formed by Carol Beecroft, and another group called the Foundation for Personality Expression (FPE), which was formed by Virginia Prince. And...it was founded by and for Crossdressers: Tri-Ess (Society for the Second Self) is an international educational, social, and support group for heterosexual cross-dressers, their partners, and their families. I do remember the founder talking about it on that famous documentary of the early 80's? All Dressed Up with No Place to Go...you can find it on you tube Joann I believe...

Well.... Hum, I can see the difference obviously between Crossdressers and Transexuals and even DRAG Stars as performers. Yes, I can see the need for some division and that the interests are very different for all of these...Drag Stars probably do not need a group.

I wonder if a proposal could be made for a division under Tri-Ess so that there could be some kind of an accommodaton. there could be a general meet up and the divisions could meet in separate areas? That way interests could be defined and focused to meet the exclusive needs of both of these groups of people. Perhaps there could be one for Teens?

I can see the point that if one group moves in to dominate the agenda they are going to drive the meetings to meet their exclusive focus and needs ignoring those of the other or... only giving lip service to them in a back handed kind of way.

The only other alternative would be to form a new group and in the founding document lay out those who are not crossdressers need to move on to groups that cater exclusively to Transsexuals. Thing is many so called cross dressers may not realize they are in reality transsexuals and need to move on to one of those groups?

Oh well, while I might be interested in Tri-Ess or interested to see if it would work for myself I would have to be brave enough to attend not knowing who might be attending and what they may be like you never know... But I would have to drive probably a couple hours...which is why I am on this site. I do see lgbtq activitiy on fb locally as social activities I could attend but I have trepidation because essentially I am just a normal guy (society would never see me that way!) but not knowing any about this part of who I am they certainly do see me as a fully acceptable man. Funny how that works. I am not into tattoos, piercings, or shades of grey with every kind of deviant behaviour known to man...I even dress and am as a mainstream woman. I would not wish politics to be any part of such a group I am not an activist but if the focus were exclusively on crossdressing and family life etc...I might find it a very good thing for myself. The other part of this is the extreme divergence in backgrounds and social status...wealth to extreme poverty...might mean there is room for outreach and a social worker or some way to help especially if there turned out to be an addict or two....hum I suppose that is why I am satisfied with an online experience to a point because pull in all of that into a little building perhaps in a part of town that is not so good and wow! I would never be interested in attending that kettle of fish.

[Wesley]

I can see the point that if one group moves in to dominate the agenda they are going to drive the meetings to meet their exclusive focus and needs ignoring those of the other or... only giving lip service to them in a back handed kind of way.

The only other alternative would be to form a new group and in the founding document lay out those who are not crossdressers need to move on to groups that cater exclusively to Transsexuals. Thing is many so called cross dressers may not realize they are in reality transsexuals and need to move on to one of those groups?
.

Anne,
That is exactly what happened to most of the groups. In OKC, transgender people co-opted the group and drove away much of the membership. I had several emails back and forth with the founder of Tri-ess, where it was reiterated that was also the case in the other chapters that folded.

So, as a result, there are now transgender groups in many cities but crossdressing groups in but a few. The other alternative you describe is pretty much what happened in the chapters that survive. In the long run, what happened was sad, and detrimental to crossdressers.

There are several problems with establishing a new crossdressing group, the biggest of which is time. The time for word to get around that there is a crossdressing group, and enough time for those interested to actually attend. The other is getting the word out to people who would be interested in the first place. This would seem to be a good source, but I only got a couple of inquiries here. Fetlife is nothing but a freak show. I encourage anyone interested to take a look at the site under crossdressing, but I don't think you would care for what you find. Seems I got about 8-10 replies there, with a majority, people looking to hook up. My queries are still up on their site, and have gone unanswered for some time now.

Lastly, about the internet. I think of the internet gaining widespread acceptance at around the time the pentium chip and Windows 95 came about, around '95 or so. I believe I was also on the other similar site you mention that went belly up. It has generally been a good resource IF you know how to use it. Heaven knows, there are plenty of bad sites out there, and I wonder what the penetration (if you will) of the actual community is for crossdressers-haven.com.