Emily's Cat
Rarely prone to hissy-fits
Yes, it's certainly possible to have a sexual fetish or unusual arousal pattern without it being a disorder. That's true for nearly all behavioral disorders. A person can have narcissistic characteristics, or antisocial, or bipolar, without rising to the level of a clinical disorder. While the specifics vary and I'm no expert, to be diagnosed with a clinical disorder, the behaviors have to cause distress to the individual, or they have to present a risk or a material imposition on other people, or cause other people distress. That last bit is important for things like psychopathic behaviors, because psychopaths are almost never distressed by their own behaviors, but they cause all sorts of problems and risks for everyone around them.Okay, so it's pretty clear that the Psychiatric consensus is that transvestic disorder can manifest as or with autogynaephilia.
So my question is, does that mean all autogynaephilia is a manifestation of transvestic disorder? Is it possible for a man have an erotic fantasy in which he identifies in whole or in part with a female participant, without also suffering from transvestic disorder?
One of the problems with paraphilias specifically is that they function very much like addictions. They tend to get stronger when they're indulged.
