Reactions and the Likeliness of Rejection

I was recently asked by someone Giles English over at Chastity Belt Erotica how vanilla women typically react to a man being a cross-dresser or sissy. 

After giving it some thought I realized that the spectrum of reactions are usually the same to pretty much all fetish activities that fall outside the realm of "standard" sexual practice.  Luckily I've never really been "discovered" by anyone vanilla.  All of my relationships since my first Mistress were basically founded upon shared kink.  I have shared some more intimate details of things with a couple of female friends over the years and luckily have never had a negative reaction, but I doubt they could be classified as the norm.

In the context of introducing your own fetish ideas to a woman that you are involved with, there's a few things to consider.

If you have a long-standing relationship, the longer you go without giving any indication about the fetish, the greater the chance that they will have feelings of betrayal and/or deceit that "color" their reactions.  These may magnify a reaction in a negative way or in rare cases it might be a "oh, that explains a lot" reaction in a good or at least neutral way.  As relationship length and intimacy grow longer, the strength of such feelings will likely increase.  Think: "I didn't know this is who I've been with for all this time..."

In a newer relationship the likeliness of them flat out rejecting you and/or betraying your confidence is higher since they aren't as emotionally invested and probably don't know you (or value you) as well as they would have if your relationship had gone on for years.  Think: "Get away from me, you pervert!"

While neither of these characteristics can guarantee an outcome, they just make certain outcomes more probable.

The three primary reactions that I would see as most common are:
A. Disgust. 
B. Curiosity. 
C. Playful amusement.

Disgust is most greatly influenced by feelings of betrayal/distrust/deceit.
Curiosity is more likely in newer relationships.
Playful amusement is equally likely in each case, but it's rare to come across a woman that is confident enough to take things in stride and be exhilarated more than freaked out.

In all cases there will likely be a period of anger/rejection on her part while she processes things but she will probably communicate about it before giving a final reaction.

Another major factor determining what her most likely reaction will be is the extremity of the fetish activity.

Everyone's scale of extremity probably looks different, but here's my own interpretation as to how I think "most people" might view things of a kinky nature with 1 being most mild and 10 being most extreme:
1.  Teasing, blindfolds, massage, body worship
2.  Light bondage, ice, mild nipple play
3.  Tease & denial, prolonged oral, mild spanking
4.  Moderate bondage, wax play, intense nipple play
5.  Humiliation, chastity, intense corporal punishment
6.  Forced feminization, face sitting, puppy/pony play
7.  Pegging, extreme bondage, blackmail (or at least the fantasy of)
8.  Cuckolding, forced bi, piercing, 24/7
9.  Branding, permanent chastity, scat play, water sports, knife/needle play
10. Heavy torture, maiming, castration, long-term imprisonment, forced transgender

The farther you go up the list the more likely you will be met with a negative reaction.  While there are cases where you might just luck out with her number one secret fantasy of all time, I wouldn't bank on it.  Basically, the more deviant the activity and its shock value, the greater risk you are taking when opening up about your secrets.

At the same time, the longer you spend keeping it a secret, the greater the chance that any negativity will be increased by feelings of betrayal and deceit. This is where it becomes a fine line.  Wait too long and you might floor her.  Do it too soon and she might drop you on the spot.

On the submissive side of things, the longer you put it off the greater chance you have of increasing fetish intensity or even advancing your fantasies to a more extreme level.  It also takes a lot of time being deceitful/ashamed and makes it even harder to share in the future.

While there's many men out there that tend to stick in this limbo between being forthcoming or keeping it completely secret, I believe they're almost better off to get it out of the way sooner rather than later.  If she processes things and accepts it, this will minimize the damage if the relationship can be salvaged.  On the chance that she may reject you for it, at least keeping secrets is over and you can start trying to find a relationship that will be fulfilling and secret-free from the start.

Also, the lower on the scale of intensities that you are when you choose to communicate, the better.  If you are riding at say a level 4 and keep it a secret from your lover, time, fantasy, and masturbating to it in secret has a nasty habit of turning a 4 into a 5, 6, 7, or 8 over a few years, which will make it even harder to communicate about openly.