I Believed I Was a Gay Woman - The Legendary Artist Enabled Me to Realize the Actual Situation

During 2011, a few years before the celebrated David Bowie display debuted at the prestigious Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I came out as a homosexual woman. Until that moment, I had solely pursued relationships with men, one of whom I had married. After a couple of years, I found myself nearing forty-five, a recently separated caregiver to four kids, making my home in the America.

During this period, I had started questioning both my sense of self and attraction preferences, searching for understanding.

I entered the world in England during the beginning of the seventies - prior to digital connectivity. During our youth, my friends and I didn't have Reddit or digital content to turn to when we had inquiries regarding sexuality; instead, we sought guidance from celebrity musicians, and during the 80s, artists were challenging gender norms.

Annie Lennox donned boys' clothes, The flamboyant singer embraced girls' clothes, and bands such as Erasure and Bronski Beat featured artists who were publicly out.

I wanted his lean physique and defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and male chest. I wanted to embody the Berlin-era Bowie

Throughout the 90s, I passed my days operating a motorcycle and dressing like a tomboy, but I went back to traditional womanhood when I chose to get married. My partner relocated us to the US in 2007, but when the marriage ended I felt an undeniable attraction back towards the manhood I had earlier relinquished.

Given that no one challenged norms as dramatically as David Bowie, I decided to spend a free afternoon during a seasonal visit back to the UK at the V&A, hoping that perhaps he could provide clarity.

I didn't know specifically what I was seeking when I walked into the exhibition - maybe I thought that by immersing myself in the opulence of Bowie's identity exploration, I might, consequently, stumble across a insight into my true nature.

Quickly I discovered myself facing a modest display where the visual presentation for "Boys Keep Swinging" was continuously looping. Bowie was moving with assurance in the front, looking stylish in a charcoal outfit, while positioned laterally three accompanying performers dressed in drag crowded round a microphone.

Unlike the performers I had encountered in real life, these female-presenting individuals didn't glide around the stage with the self-assurance of born divas; instead they looked bored and annoyed. Positioned as supporting acts, they were chewing and showed impatience at the boredom of it all.

"The song's lyrics, boys always work it out," Bowie sang cheerfully, appearing ignorant to their reduced excitement. I felt a momentary pang of understanding for the accompanying performers, with their pronounced make-up, ill-fitting wigs and constricting garments.

They seemed to experience as ill-at-ease as I did in female clothing - frustrated and eager, as if they were yearning for it all to end. Precisely when I understood I connected with three individuals presenting as female, one of them removed her wig, wiped the makeup from her face, and revealed herself to be ... Bowie! Shocker. (Understandably, there were further David Bowies as well.)

Right then, I knew for certain that I wanted to remove everything and emulate the artist. I craved his narrow hips and his sharp haircut, his defined jawline and his masculine torso; I aimed to personify the lean-figured, Bowie's German period. Nevertheless I found myself incapable, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would need to be a man.

Declaring myself as queer was one thing, but gender transition was a much more frightening prospect.

It took me additional years before I was prepared. In the meantime, I did my best to become more masculine: I ceased using cosmetics and discarded all my women's clothing, shortened my locks and commenced using masculine outfits.

I sat differently, walked differently, and modified my personal references, but I halted before surgical procedures - the potential for denial and regret had caused me to freeze with apprehension.

After the David Bowie display completed its global journey with a presentation in Brooklyn, New York, five years later, I went back. I had arrived at a crisis. I couldn't go on pretending to be a person I wasn't.

Positioned before the identical footage in 2018, I knew for certain that the challenge didn't involve my attire, it was my body. I didn't identify as a butch female; I was a feminine man who'd been in costume since birth. I wanted to transform myself into the individual in the stylish outfit, performing under lights, and now I realized that I had the capacity to.

I booked myself in to see a physician not long after. The process required additional years before my transition was complete, but not a single concern I feared came true.

I maintain many of my female characteristics, so individuals frequently misidentify me for a queer man, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I desired the liberty to experiment with identity following Bowie's example - and now that I'm at peace with myself, I can.