It is just past midnight when I hear one of my housemates open her door. I quickly turn off the little lamp above my table and try to keep as still as possible, whilst frantically trying to remember whether or not I locked my door from the inside. When my eyes have adjusted to the darkness, I can see that the handle is in its locked position. Phew.

When, a couple of minutes later, my housemate finally closes her door again, I wait another minute before turning the light back on. When I feel safe no one will notice that I’m still awake, I take my breast forms from the drawer beneath my bed and stuff them into the bra and dress I put on before I was interrupted by my housemate and her tiny blather.

The vast majority of nights I spend crossdressing, end up following a similar pattern. Because not one of my housemates know about my crossdressing habit – as a matter of fact, nobody I know in real-life knows about it – , I make sure to keep everything that has to do with crossdressing off everyone’s radar. I keep all of my clothes in the drawer under my bed, buried under a thick layer of towels and linnen. I only dress up at night, when I can pretend I’m sleeping, so that I know I won’t be bothered or interrupted. I haven’t worn my heals in months, because the loud thump-thump-thump noise they make when I walk around on my hardwood floor kind of ruins the illusion that I am sleeping.

Luckily enough, the urge to wear women’s clothing reaches a peak only about once a week, which is why keeping it a secret isn’t really that hard. Recently though, I started to realise that living in fear of a housemate barging into my room every time I’m wearing a dress, really gets in the way of me feeling comfortable when crossdressing. At the moment, I’m feeling comfortable with myself wearing a dress, but I don’t feel comfortable with the idea of someone seeing me wearing the dress. But why is that the case?

As I mentioned before, I have the privilege of being a crossdresser living in the openminded and tolerant country of The Netherlands. Because all of my housemates and most of my friends are Dutch and have all been brought up with Dutch values and standards, I’m pretty sure most of the people I care about would be able to cope with the idea of me being a crossdresser if I told them. So why don’t I just come out of the closet?

Despite the openminded nature of the Dutch, coming out as a crossdresser is still a pretty big deal. Being a crossdresser means being part of a minority and being part of a minority means drawing attention to yourself. In my case, drawing attention is way out of my comfort zone. I hate being the center of attention and thrive whilst living my life quite anonymously in the background.

Also, there’s the fact I don’t like to be thought of as a crossdresser. Sure, I’m a guy that crossdresses, but my crossdressing habit doesn’t define who I am. There’s a lot more to me than just the crossdressing part and I’m afraid of the rest of my personality being nullified by my crossdressing habit, as that’s the part that stands out the most and what people will focus on.

The only way to combat those issues is to only come out to the people who are extremely close to me. This however, means I’ll have to manage who I tell what very carefully and, at this point, that sounds much more complicated than just not telling anybody. As it would also involve growing a pair, I’m still trying to convince myself I’m better of not telling anybody. I’m getting less convinced by the week though.