I Believed Myself to Be a Homosexual Woman - The Music Icon Enabled Me to Discover the Actual Situation

During 2011, a couple of years ahead of the celebrated David Bowie display debuted at the famous Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I came out as a gay woman. Previously, I had exclusively dated men, with one partner I had wed. After a couple of years, I found myself approaching middle age, a recently separated parent to four children, residing in the US.

Throughout this phase, I had begun to doubt both my sense of self and attraction preferences, seeking out answers.

I entered the world in England during the early 1970s - before the internet. During our youth, my friends and I didn't have Reddit or digital content to reference when we had questions about sex; instead, we sought guidance from celebrity musicians, and during the 80s, artists were experimenting with gender norms.

The iconic vocalist wore male clothing, The flamboyant singer adopted women's fashion, and musical acts such as well-known groups featured performers who were openly gay.

I wanted his lean physique and sharp haircut, his strong features and male chest. I aimed to personify the Bowie's Berlin period

In that decade, I spent my time operating a motorcycle and adopting masculine styles, but I reverted back to traditional womanhood when I decided to wed. My partner transferred our home to the US in 2007, but when the marriage ended I felt an irresistible pull revisiting the male identity I had earlier relinquished.

Considering that no artist played with gender to the extent of David Bowie, I opted to use some leisure time during a summer trip back to the UK at the V&A, with the expectation that possibly he could guide my understanding.

I lacked clarity exactly what I was seeking when I stepped inside the display - perhaps I hoped that by immersing myself in the richness of Bowie's norm-challenging expression, I might, consequently, stumble across a insight into my own identity.

Before long I was facing a modest display where the visual presentation for "Boys Keep Swinging" was playing on repeat. Bowie was moving with assurance in the front, looking stylish in a charcoal outfit, while off to one side three backing singers wearing women's clothing crowded round a microphone.

In contrast to the entertainers I had encountered in real life, these ladies failed to move around the stage with the self-assurance of born divas; instead they looked unenthused and frustrated. Placed in secondary positions, they chewed gum and expressed annoyance at the boredom of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie performed brightly, apparently oblivious to their lack of enthusiasm. I felt a brief sensation of connection for the backing singers, with their heavy makeup, awkward hairpieces and too-tight dresses.

They gave the impression of as awkward as I did in women's clothes - annoyed and restless, as if they were longing for it all to conclude. At the moment when I recognized my alignment with three men dressed in drag, one of them removed her wig, smeared the lipstick from her face, and revealed herself to be ... Bowie! Revelation. (Of course, there were additional David Bowies as well.)

At that moment, I knew for certain that I aimed to shed all constraints and transform like Bowie. I wanted his slender frame and his defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and his masculine torso; I sought to become the slender-shaped, artist's Berlin phase. However I found myself incapable, because to authentically transform into Bowie, first I would need to be a man.

Coming out as queer was a separate matter, but personal transformation was a much more frightening possibility.

I needed further time before I was prepared. In the meantime, I made every effort to embrace manhood: I ceased using cosmetics and eliminated all my skirts and dresses, shortened my locks and started wearing men's clothes.

I sat differently, walked differently, and modified my personal references, but I stopped short of surgical procedures - the potential for denial and second thoughts had left me paralysed with fear.

After the David Bowie display finished its world tour with a stint in Brooklyn, New York, following that period, I went back. I had arrived at a crisis. I found it impossible to maintain the facade to be something I was not.

Positioned before the identical footage in 2018, I knew for certain that the issue didn't involve my attire, it was my physical form. I wasn't a masculine woman; I was a man with gentle characteristics who'd been in costume since birth. I aimed to transition into the man in the sharp suit, moving in the illumination, and then I comprehended that I was able to.

I made arrangements to see a medical professional shortly afterwards. The process required additional years before my transformation concluded, but none of the things I anticipated materialized.

I still have many of my female characteristics, so others regularly misinterpret me for a gay man, but I accept this. I wanted the freedom to explore expression as Bowie had - and given that I'm at peace with myself, I have that capacity.