I am Christine Parker, Member #704, the Web-mistress, and unofficial Historian of the Seahorse Society of NSW.

I was born in Prestwick, Scotland in 1948, but grew up in Rhyl, North Wales, and emigrated to Sydney in 1959. I was already an active but secret cross-dresser before the age of 9. My mother discovered that I had been wearing her clothes when I was 17.

I had had intermittent experience with public cross-dressing dating back to the mid-1960's and through the 1970's, but had never before had the opportunity to meet other cross-dressers socially.

I joined Seahorse in early 2007, some 35 years after I had first heard of the organisation. I had always wanted to join Seahorse, but various life commitments had stopped me joining prior to early 2007.

In 2008, 12 months after joining, I became a committee member and I volunteered to take over the then out-dated and neglected Seahorse website, having had extensive experience as a hobby website designer since the 1990's. I soon became an active Seahorse committee member.

After re-designing the website, I introduced an on-line application form to join Seahorse, leading to a significant increase in membership, with a resultant boost in income for Seahorse. I also introduced on-line distribution of the monthly Seahorse magazine, leading a significant saving in printing and postal costs.

In May 2011, I took on the role as Seahorse President for 12 months to help give Seahorse a new direction.

In 2012, I took on the role of Seahorse Membership Secretary, and later became the unofficial Seahorse Historian, researching and writing the Definitive History of Seahorse over a period of several months.

My greatest pride and joy has been creating and constantly improving the Seahorse website. This has included reactivating and running the Seahorse Forum, creating the Resources Section, Members Section, and Partners Section of the website.

I am always looking for new ways to improve the website, using my experience creating images with Photoshop, as well my knowledge of hand-coded html, cascading style sheets, javascript and perl scripts. I frequently make lots of little tweaks and additions to enhance the website and make it more attractive and user-friendly. I try to make sure that the information on the website is always up-to-date.

I have been strongly committed to helping and supporting members, and new members in particular. I have created a Crossing-dressing Guide, Make-up Tips for Beginners, and has written several other helpful articles, including tutorials on body shaping, guides to better passing as a woman, and well as three autobiographical articles.

I am married to a wonderful and tolerant woman, who has always been accepting and supportive, as have my two young adult daughters. My family and I have had many social outings together over the years, including the Seahorse Ball and shopping trips to Sydney. My brothers and their families have also been accepting.

I have worked hard on improving my appearance as a woman, including growing my hair, now with the addition of a human hairpiece to cover the thinner areas (see photo above left). I have worked on improving my make-up skills, using body shaping, refining my feminine posture, gestures and gait, and I have even been told that my voice is pretty good, too. I have found these skills have been actually easier to achieve as I have become older.

I go out in public as a woman a minimum of three times a month to Seahorse and other functions, and any other time I have the opportunity I get to go out shopping or take in a movie. I no longer worry if I get "read", which occasionally does happen.

In 2014, I began taking a yearly two-week holiday, travelling en-femme the whole time, visiting state capitals, meeting up with friends and family, and attending other trans-organisations' functions. In 2014, I visited Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney, flying between these cities. Read a report of the 2014 trip.

In 2015, I did a driving holiday, which included visiting a Seahorse member in Coff's Harbour, my brother and his wife in north-west of Lismore, and visiting my daughter and grandchildren in Brisbane. The trip concluded, as it did last year, with the Seahorse Ball in Sydney on 15th August. I drove about 2000 kms on the trip, much further than I have ever driven before as a woman. Read a report of the 2015 trip.

In September 2016, I had my yearly holiday in Sydney, meeting up with friends and family.

While I have reduced my involvement in Seahorse to some extent at this stage, I feel that joining Seahorse has been a positive, life-changing experience for me and can be for you too.

In late 2017 Christine passed away, her contribution to the club has been very much appreciated and she will be missed by the Seahorse Society and its members.