If It Was Your Husband 11 and 12 of 20

By Patricia Marie Allen

Chapter 11
Outed times two

  Carrie wasn’t home when I got there, so I changed clothes. I got out a top she’d all but given me. It was way too feminine for me to wear out of the house, but she said that she liked it on me. This was the first time I’d worn it without her suggesting it. It fit me a little tighter and was a little thin; thin enough that you could see my cami and bra straps through it in the right light. I went into the bathroom and recreated the look that Janet had demonstrated. Opening the drawer, I got out Carrie’s makeup bag and pulled out her spare lipstick and mascara. I had some experience with mascara, but this would be my first time solo. It took two tries before I got it passable.

  When I was through I went to the long mirror in our bedroom. I stared at my reflection. With just that little bit of makeup, my masculine edges were totally blurred. I could have been the sister I never had. I shuddered to think what I would look like if I let Carrie have her way with all the tricks in that makeup bag.

  I shook myself and hurried to the bathroom and made use of the wipes to remove the makeup. I was careful to be sure that it all came off and changed back into my polo shirt. I didn’t want Carrie to use it as an excuse to escalate things.

  I reflected on what I’d done. It was so cross-dresser like. I borrowed my wife’s top while she was out, played with her makeup, and then destroyed the evidence that I’d done it so she wouldn’t know.

  Life went on. I might just as well have thrown away my jockey shorts and wife beater undershirts for all I wore them. I was underdressing full time. And more times than not, I had the extra enhancements in my bra. Still, Carrie never seemed to notice; even at night on the weekends when I chose to leave my bra on under my nightgown. Oh, she did notice the bra and teased me a little about liking it so much that I couldn’t bear to take it off. What really motivated me to keep it on was that it hid those little extra additions.

  Then in May, I had my third appointment with Janet. It went pretty much like the last one. Once again, she complimented me on the condition of my hair. When she got through this time and was experimenting with different styles I could achieve things got interesting. She got out a curling iron and put some wave in my hair, recreated the bangs, and stood behind me as she showed off her handy work in the mirror.

  “You have lovely hair, now that you’re taking care of it. Any woman would be proud to look like this.”

  This was a very feminine me. I’d worn a top that Carrie had found online from a site called “Woman Within.” I thought it would have been a cross-dresser’s website, but it was a plus-size woman’s clothing site. The top was called a “Big Shirt.” It looked like any other Oxford shirt, but of course the buttons were on the left side. Under it, I had worn a black cami that I had noticed and commented on as being sexy when Carrie was browsing the site. It had a lot of lace trim with the most being right across the bust… about a four-inch band. Carrie took that as a hint and included the black one and a matching white one in the order that fetched three of these Big Shirts. At home, I left the top three buttons undone so that the lace peeked out on occasion. I was sorely tempted to do that now to get the full effect.

  When Janet was putting my hair back to the masculine look that I’d come in with she asked, “Does Carrie know the real reason you’re letting your hair grow out?”

  “Real reason?”

  She reached around and took a button in her fingers and gave a little tug.

  “I noticed the shirt because I have one just like it. I’ll bet that if I were to take a look at the tag, it would say “Woman Within” wouldn’t it? Don’t get upset, I won’t say anything to her if you don’t want me to. You aren’t my first transgender client. Some of them just throw caution to the wind and let anybody and everybody know. Others keep it secret from their wives and family. I’m betting that you’re underdressed as well.” She slid her hand down my back and stopped as it crossed my bra strap.

  I was dumbfounded. I didn’t know what to say. She just looked at me in the mirror. Finally I found my tongue. I decided to tell her everything. Well not the whole story. She didn’t need to know about Mike and Lisa.

  “Yes, she knows. To be totally honest she’s been fascinated about cross-dressers since she was fourteen. She saw some talk show where there were married cross-dressers. Anyway, something sparked her interest and she decided that she’d like to walk in the shoes of those wives on the show. It took a little while (I didn’t tell her how little – less than twenty-four hours) but she talked me into trying it. So anyway, on weekends I don’t wear any men’s clothes. Is that sick or what?”

  “Not sick. It’s sweet of you to give in to her curiosity. So, do you like the experience or do you just go along with what Carrie wants?”

  “Strangely enough, I like it. I don’t know if I’ve become a real cross-dresser, but I can see the appeal it has to them.”

  There was another of Carrie’s friends or associates that knew of what we’re doing.

  Carrie had invited Lisa and Mike for a barbecue on Memorial Day. She hadn’t bothered to tell me until Friday evening. It had been nearly four months since I’d had a chance to talk with Mike, probably the longest time since I’d first met him, so I didn’t make a big deal about it. At least Carrie had gone shopping and bought everything we needed. By this time, I had a good selection of women’s clothes that would pass for men’s and I was in the habit of wearing them, most of the time. So I was in some denim shorts and a baggy t-shirt with a flannel “big shirt” over it unbuttoned and a new pair of Crocs that were only sized in women’s sizes. I was also in the habit of wearing one of those bras that fit me all the time including the extra that I’d become used to, so that was included in my underwear. I was a little nervous that Lisa would have her cross-dresser radar tuned in and spot it. But then that was kind of the idea behind Carrie’s experiment. An experiment that had taken on a life of its own.

  I was outside getting the barbecue ready when they showed up. I greeted Mike as he came to the patio door.

  “Hey, buddy, glad you could make it. Long time no see. Why don’t you grab a couple of beers out of the fridge and bring me one?”

  He looked at Lisa and she nodded. I found that a bit unsettling. It was obvious that he needed her permission to come out on the patio, like I might be a bad influence on him. Thinking about Carrie’s experiment, if she knew, I’m sure she’d feel that was the case.

  Mike joined me as I lit the barbecue and handed me the beer. He gave me a weak smile. He was a shadow of my old friend. It was clear to me that he was miserable. We sat down at the patio table while we waited for the barbecue to come up to heat and sipped our beers. I noticed that Carrie had poured some white wine for her and Lisa and they were leaning across the kitchen island. Mike glanced inside before he leaned in and said, “Lisa’s been in a snit for a while now. I’m surprised that she accepted the invitation to come.”

  I took a long pull on my beer before I said anything.

  “Look, Mike, I think you should know that Lisa came over the Friday before Thanksgiving looking for sympathy from Carrie and they kind of got into it. Lisa ended up leaving in a huff.”

  Mike looked surprised.

  “It was the day you guys were supposed to go away for that long weekend.”

  Mike looked down. “I suppose she told Carrie all about what she found out.”

  “Yeah, Carrie told me. Look, it doesn’t mean anything to me. What kind of clothes a man wears is his business and nobody else’s. You’re my oldest friend. We’ve been best buds since middle school. I know you probably better than anyone else in the world. This isn’t going to come between us.”

  Mike looked inside again. “So you know all about my ‘perversion’?”

  “I’d say that perversion is a matter of perception,” I told him as I got up to toss the baked potatoes on the upper rack of the barbecue and adjust the temp.

  It was Mike’s turn to take a long pull on his beer. He closed his eyes. In a low voice, he said, “You know that wasn’t the first time I’d done that.”

  “I suspected as much.”

  “Oh God, I’ve never been able to talk to anyone about this, at least not a friend. Lisa’s got me going to a shrink. I have to talk to him about it. Thank God he doesn’t want Lisa in the room. He just asks a lot of questions and gets me talking about how I feel. I keep waiting for him to suggest shock therapy or send me off to one of those cure camps I’ve heard about.”

  I looked him in the eye. “Do you want to be ‘cured’?”

  He looked in the kitchen again and then back at me as if to study me. In the end, he looked down and shook his head no. “I’ve tried before to quit, but the longest I’ve made it before now was four months. I thought when I got married, I’d just lose interest. But it just got worse. The closet is full of Lisa’s clothes and a surprising number of them fit me. The only things of hers that I can’t fit into some of are her shoes. Up until she came home early that Friday, I had a pair of heels. No more. She broke the heel off of them and threw them in the garbage.”

  “You know that she was pissed at Carrie just after she caught you.”

  “Yeah, I couldn’t figure that out.”

  “When she came crying to Carrie about you, Carrie told her about an old talk show host, Phil Donahue, who had married cross-dressers on the show and said it really wasn’t all that bad. Lisa didn’t take that well and told her that if it was her husband, she wouldn’t think it was cool, and stormed out. So Carrie took that as a challenge and came up with a plan to find out if that was true.”

  I noticed that Carrie and Lisa were heading our way. I motioned with my head in that direction and said, “I’ll be glad to talk some more if we can get some time alone.”

  Mike glanced toward the patio door and mumbled, “Not much chance of that. She’s got me on a pretty short leash.”

  Carrie had the steaks on a plate covered with foil and Lisa carried the salad.

  “I saw you put the potatoes in, and I think they should be done soon, so I brought the steaks out,” Carrie said.

  They joined us at the picnic table. The first thing Lisa said was, “So Carrie tells me you’re feeling old.”

  “Yeah, I made the mistake of thinking of twenty-five as being a quarter of a century. Now, here I am, rushing toward the big three-oh.” It was a practiced line that I used whenever anyone mentioned me letting my hair grow out. I knew that’s where she was heading. It was hard for people not to notice these days. For work I moussed it and kept it close to my head, only letting it loosely cover the top of my ears. It was getting too long to get away with that for much longer. On the weekends, I shampooed and conditioned it and fluffed it with a blow dryer. Today, I’d hit it lightly with some hair spray; I knew I’d be outside and subject to errant breezes. The layering Janet had done really made my hair look full of body. To my surprise, my hair had a bit of natural curl.

  “Well, it does make you look younger. I’m a little surprised. You’ve always struck me as a conservative.”

  “You didn’t know me in college. I was pretty much one of the radical left. You could say I was an idealist. Then I graduated and entered the real world. While I still consider myself a social liberal, I’ve become a political and fiscal conservative. It serves me well in business.”

   “Come to think of it, some of Mike’s stories about you two in college make that seem plausible.”

  At this point in the conversation, I’d have expected Mike to join in and point out that he and I share the same political and fiscal views. But he sat silently by. Another indication that Lisa had him cowed. My heart went out to him.

  We spent the afternoon pretty much as we’d always spent it when Mike and Lisa were over. I got over my nervousness about Lisa noticing. Carrie had mentioned that people decided what to think about what you were wearing in the first thirty seconds of seeing it and then didn’t reevaluate that opinion and that they usually saw what they expected to see. That must have been true of Lisa that day because, aside from her comments on my hair, she never blinked when looking at me. She didn’t notice that my shorts had the fly being right over left, or that it was shorter. Nor did she notice the buttons on my flannel shirt being on the left.

  After we ate, Carrie, according to plan, maneuvered Lisa into the kitchen, leaving Mike and me to clean up the grill.

  “Mike, I don’t know if I should say anything, but you should know that I’ve been looking into just what cross-dressing is all about.”

  “Unless you’re involved in it, you can only get an academic understanding. You’d have to try it and like it to get a true understanding of what I go through.”

  “That was my conclusion too,” I said taking hold of one of the buttons on my shirt and pulling the shirt out an inch or so. I glanced down at what I was doing. Mike glanced down as well. He looked back up and then did a double-take.

  “You’re kidding me.” He looked toward the kitchen and back at me. “You’re…”

  I glanced at the kitchen to be sure that Carrie had Lisa occupied. I pulled the neck of my t-shirt aside to reveal the bra strap. “From the skin out.”

  “You’re wearing a bra?” he hissed.

  I nodded my head. “Yeah, they were special order. It seems that one of Carrie’s high school friends runs a lingerie shop and caters to the Trans community.”

  “Which one?”

  “Ann’s Lingerie and More.”

  “I know the place. I’ve never had the courage to go in though.”

  “Like I said, Ann is an old high school friend to Carrie. She had to order them special. I should wear a 38, but she put me in a 36A push up. With the little silicone pads at the bottom of the cups, it pushes my chest’s flab up and gives just a little cleavage. It’s kind of a thrill to look at in the mirror.”

  “I can identify, only I had to use a lot of tape and some birdseed in a nylon to get that effect. God, I wish I could wear a bra that fits me.”

  Mike looked at the kitchen again. “You wear all this stuff and Carrie knows?”

  “It was her idea.”

  “So, how did you start?”

  “Carrie convinced me to give it a try so she could find out if it made a difference when it was her husband. I went along because I knew that when Carrie got an idea in her head, she’d not let it go. When I agreed to try it, I expected to not feel anything but uncomfortable or perhaps embarrassed. I didn’t see how me putting on women’s clothes would prove anything. I at least knew enough about cross-dressing to know that it was more than wearing the clothes. I figured I’d humor Carrie for a week or two and it would be over. But she went at it like a general on a battlefield campaign. She seemed to intuitively know just how to get me to admit to my feelings about it.

  “To my surprise, I did like it, though I wouldn’t admit it to myself for weeks. By the time we got together for dinner after New Year’s, I was pretty much ensconced in underdressing. Not quite full time, but more often than not. And I was cross-dressed from the skin out at that dinner too.”

  “So you’re telling me that you’re a cross-dresser too?”

  “I’m afraid so. Trust me; I’d like to say that I’m not. But in all honesty, I’ve come to like it, and I doubt if I’d be able to just stop and never do it again.”

  Mike gave me a rueful smile and chuckled a little.

  “Welcome to the club, sister,” he said.

  By that time, we’d finished cleaning the grill, and it would seem odd if we just stood around out there. With evening coming on, it was getting a little chilly. So we covered the grill and went inside.

Chapter 12
Admitting it out loud

  About an hour later, the girls were watching a chick flick on TV while we were drinking coffee. I had a sudden urge to show Mike my newly acquired wardrobe.

  “Hey Mike, you replaced your shower valves last year, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah. You should know. When I was showing off my handiwork, you told me that it was the same one as you had in your master bath.”

  He was right, I did know and I remember telling him that.

  “That’s what I thought. Mine has begun leaking and I’m going to need to open it up to replace some of the guts, but I don’t want to shut the water off to the whole house.” Carrie looked up at me, and I gave her a little shake of my head, ‘no’. I continued talking to Mike. “I remember that you had the water shut off at the valve in the bathroom. I took a look, but I can’t seem to figure out how to do it. Would you mind taking a look and show me how?”

  “Sure, we’ll need a big flat-blade screwdriver.”

  I went to the laundry room where my household toolbox was, and grabbed the biggest screwdriver I had there. It wasn’t all that big, but I was counting on Lisa either not paying attention or not knowing how big a big screwdriver should be. Mike started to say something, but I shushed him and motioned him to follow me.

  In the master bedroom I said, “There’s nothing wrong with the shower, I just wanted to get you in here where we could talk.”

  “OK.”

  “I just wanted you to know how much I’m into this. So I thought I would show you the clothes I’ve amassed since this started. Do you want to see?”

  He took a deep breath as though it was hard to do so. He bit his lip and then said, “It’ll be like being a kid in a candy store without enough money to buy anything, but I guess I’d like to live vicariously through you, so yes.”

  I pulled open my underwear drawer where alongside my currently unused tighty-whities there was nearly a dozen pair of panties and camis, two 36 A bras, and one 38 C. In one corner of the drawer were the boxed C-cup breast forms. Mike scanned the drawer and stared at the boxes. They were clearly labeled.

  “Are those what I think they are?”

  I nodded and pulled the lid off one and took the form out, rolling it over. It looked like a disembodied boob.

  “God, I’m seriously jealous. I’ve always wanted a pair of those, but they’re a bit expensive and would be tough to hide.” He reached out and touched it tenderly as if he was afraid it would break.

  I put it back in and closed the box, then opened my closet. I pointed out the now four pairs of women’s shoes and then the left side where my dress and other women’s clothes were hanging.

  “That dress makes me think of the cross-dresser’s mantra, ‘all dressed up and no place to go.’ Where would you wear a dress like that?”

  “Carrie and I rang in the New Year while I was wearing that. She did my hair and some makeup, and we watched the ball drop, and she kissed me. Lipstick on lipstick, that’s an experience I never thought I’d have.”

  “Oh God, I’m so damned jealous I could spit.”

  “I’m not sure just how Carrie will pull it off, but when she figures the time is right, I’m sure she’ll prove to Lisa that she still thinks cross-dressing is cool even if it is her husband with the idea being that since they’ll be on even ground, Lisa might listen to reason and lighten up on you.”

  “I can’t tell you that right now is not that time. Frankly, I’m surprised that she agreed to come over here. You guys are the only ones we’ve had any social contact with since before Thanksgiving. You know she didn’t want to do that dinner with you guys. She said Carrie bullied her into it.”

  “I thought as much, and I suspect that was the case for today as well. I can tell you first hand when Carrie puts her mind to it, she could talk a polar bear out of his pelt. I suspect that Carrie will engineer more of these get-togethers, and at each one, I’ll be fully cross-dressed.”

  Mike nodded his head and looked wistfully at my closet.

  “I think we’ve probably used up all the time we can claim for looking at the shutoff on the shower control. We’d better get back before they come looking for us, and Lisa finds out too soon that I’m cross-dressing.”

  “About that, tell Carrie to wait quite a while and choose her time carefully. If Lisa isn’t ready, you’ll set back whatever progress I’ve made to that point. What’s worse, she’ll forbid me to have any contact with you.”

  “I will buddy, I will.”

  When they first arrived, Lisa had seemed a little uptight, but by the time they were ready to leave, she had loosened up quite a bit and seemed more like the Lisa of old.

  As we were seeing them out the door, Lisa said, “Thanks for having us. It was good to get out. I nearly began to suffer cabin fever. Today it was almost like before…” she paused to shoot a stern look at Mike, “we’ll have to do this again.”

  “I agree; the sooner the better,” Carrie agreed. “Why don’t we plan a dinner and a movie out next month, say for my birthday? It falls on a Saturday this year.”

  “Sounds good, I’ll call you.”

  “I know that our shower isn’t leaking, so what did you and Mike get up to when you were supposed to be learning how to shut off the water to the shower?”

  “I could see that Mike was miserable when they came over, so while we were setting up the grill, I told him that we knew about his cross-dressing. One thing led to another, and I felt like I had to do something to let him know that it didn’t make any difference to us.

  “We talked and I let him in on the experiment.”

  Carrie raised her eyebrows. “When you say ‘let him in on the experiment,’ what did you say?”

  “I made sure he noticed that the clothes I’m wearing are women’s. When he did, I let him know it was from the skin out. We talked about how that came to be and I told him the whole story. Though it had to be in bits and pieces because you and Lisa were around off and on. I used the shower as an excuse to get him away from Lisa. I showed him my wardrobe so he could see just where I was in this.”

  “So, just where are you in this?”

  “I think you know.”

  “I think I do too, but I want to hear you say it.”

  “I… I’m a cross-dresser. A real cross-dresser, not just experimenting to help a friend.”

  Carrie smiled, and wrapped me in a hug. “I’ve known that since New Year’s. I’m happy to hear you admit it to yourself. It’ll make what we have to do for Mike easier. You won’t have to try to convince yourself that it’s all for show.

  “So, now that your true feelings are out in the open, how do you want to proceed from here?”

  Having admitted to Carrie and more importantly to myself that I was a cross-dresser, I had to come to grips with just what that meant in my life. I resorted to a lot of online research. I studied every professional paper I could stomach. The information was overwhelming. I also frequented cross-dress sites, the online community, so to speak. I was only a lurker. I didn’t register on any of the sites. That would have meant admitting to the world I was a cross-dresser. I later came to understand that the need for anonymity was quite common among cross-dressers. Here we were in the 21st century, and still cross-dressing was considered a perversion by most people, though Gender Dysphoria seemed to be finding a footing, at least in the legal and medical realms. Yet, only those with nothing to lose were willing to be open about it.

  I read horror stories of marriages breaking up (Lisa’s attitude seemed prevalent among wives) and of jobs lost, of families disowning the transgender individual. I also discretely looked up my company’s policies. Fortunately, it was all contained in the employee handbook they gave new employees. Like most people, I had given mine a cursory thumb through and tossed it in a drawer.

  The relevant passage:

  It is the policy of the company, to treat all individuals the same in any aspect of employment practices without regard to race, religion, creed, color, national origin, disability, marital status, sex, age, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, genetic information, or any other protected class in accordance with applicable federal laws.

  At last, I began to take this cross-dressing thing seriously, and so did Carrie. The very next Saturday when I went to get dressed, I was in for a surprise. I had thought that since I was an admitted cross-dresser that maybe I should experiment with a more feminine look and was thinking about just how to do that when I opened my closet. There, next to my assortment of women’s trousers and androgynous tops, were three skirts and two dresses. I recognized one of the dresses from when Carrie had taken me shopping. While in the women’s department, she insisted that we needed to look at more than just trousers and tops. She maintained that even if a woman wasn’t going to buy, she would at least look at dresses. The dress in question was one that I had commented on as being “nice.” I couldn’t be sure about the other one. It may have been there as well. As for the skirts, they all looked similar to ones I had admired on Carrie.

  I took out the gray pleated one that would strike me at the knee. Carrie had one like it, but this one was definitely mine. It was fitted at the waist and over the hip where the pleats began. The waist closed with a zipper at the back and was not the right size for Carrie. All of her things I’d worn had elastic waists; any of the others were just too small for me.

  Wearing my robe, which Carrie had exchanged for a quilted blue robe, I took the skirt out to the kitchen, where I knew Carrie would be putting together our usual weekend breakfast. The blue robe was definitely feminine. My old robe was tucked away up on a shelf in case I need a robe for someone else to see.

  “Carrie, what’s with these skirts?”

  “Well, as I remember, last year, you and Mike decided to go to the Highland Games and since you both have decidedly Scottish last names, you’d both be wearing kilts. The games are only six weeks or so away. If you’re going to spend the day in a kilt. I think it would behoove you to find out if you can actually do it without flashing your underwear to all and sundry. Kilts start at a hundred dollars and can be more than a thousand. So rather than spend all that money only to find out you’re not comfortable in a kilt, I thought a couple of skirts to practice in would be in order. Besides, since you’ve finally admitted to being a cross-dresser, you’ll want the skirts sooner or later.”

  There was a certain amount of twisted logic in what she said. That and I’d just been thinking that maybe I should expand my feminine wardrobe to include more than pants and tops.

  It took some effort, but I got it on. After fumbling with the catch behind me for a while, I turned it around, hooked and zipped it. It was quite an effort to turn it back around. The waist was tight, but the hips were loose. I had thought I’d wear a tucked in blouse with it, but there was no way I’d be able to get the hem of the blouse inside the waistband. I opted for a pullover that came to a few inches below the skirt’s waist. I put on my sandals and looked in the mirror. My hair really needed some help. I was in the bathroom brushing it out when Carrie called me for breakfast.

  Carrie smiled when I came into the kitchen. She gestured toward the table and watched as I sat down. There was just a little hitch in my movement as I remembered what I’d read about smoothing your skirt as you sit down. Carrie’s smile switched to one of amusement, but she said nothing. She placed a cup of freshly poured coffee in front of me and leaned in for a quick kiss.

  “You don’t have any makeup on.”

  “No, I’ve only worn makeup that once on New Year’s, and you did that for me. I really don’t have a clue as to how to go about doing makeup.” I wasn’t about to admit that I’d experimented while she was out.

  She sat, and we tucked into the French toast she’d prepared.

  As she speared a couple of slices off the plate in the middle of the table, she said, “Well, for around the house, there’s no need for much. Just a little lipstick and mascara. You’ve done that much yourself… and maybe a touch of blush, but not much. You’re lucky; being an ash blonde you don’t have a five o’clock shadow to hide. What I did for New Year’s was for an evening out. You always go a little more dramatic for that. I’ll give you a quick refresher course after we eat.”

  So with Carrie watching, I put on mascara. I got the right eye good on the first try, but the left eye was a bit more challenging. I’m decidedly right-handed, but try as I would, I couldn’t get my right hand twisted around to do the left side. I need to do it with my left hand. That hand is so uncoordinated that it took two tries, and then I had to carefully wipe some off my lower lid. As before, lipstick was a breeze. Then she handed me the blush and talked me through the application. What an eye opener. It seemed counterintuitive, but it involved putting it on and removing most of it with a large fluffy brush. It seemed to me that it all came off, but looking in the mirror, some of it must have remained because my cheekbones were quite noticeable.

  “There,” she said, “now you can do that for yourself whenever you dress. Don’t you think it looks good? It certainly takes the edge off any residual man tell-tales in your appearance.”

  I studied my reflection in the long mirror on the back of the door. She was right. With what Janet had done with my hair, the top and skirt, the makeup did do away with the masculine look that I always thought I had. And it wasn’t really that much. The cross-dressing makeover videos I’d watched on YouTube were way overkill.

  Makeup became part of my routine after that. I never dressed without at least mascara and lipstick and on the weekends, I added the blush. The mascara became easier as my left hand learned the muscle memory to do it. The only drawback was I always spent some time admiring my handiwork.

  I still went with pants of some kind after work, but on the weekend, I did wear the skirts and even the two dresses. That was definitely a new experience. I had become deft at doing up my bra behind my back, but doing a zipper on a dress was more of a challenge. I solved it with the use of a bobby pin. While the zipper pulls were tiny, they did have a small hole in the end and I found that I could fit a bobby pin through that hole and then, with a little contorting, I could pull the waist of the dress down as I pushed the zipper up, and then pulling the dress up at the shoulder I could get a hold on the bobby pin to pull it up while pulling the waist back down. Remove the bobby pin and set it aside for when I needed it to get out of the dress.