I Believed I Was a Lesbian - The Music Icon Enabled Me to Uncover the Reality

Back in 2011, several years before the celebrated David Bowie exhibition opened at the famous Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I came out as a homosexual woman. Up to that point, I had exclusively dated men, with one partner I had married. By 2013, I found myself nearing forty-five, a recently separated caregiver to four kids, living in the United States.

During this period, I had started questioning both my sense of self and sexual orientation, looking to find understanding.

My birthplace was England during the beginning of the seventies - before the internet. When we were young, my companions and myself lacked access to Reddit or digital content to reference when we had curiosities about intimacy; conversely, we looked to pop stars, and during the 80s, everyone was experimenting with gender norms.

The Eurythmics singer donned masculine attire, Boy George adopted girls' clothes, and pop groups such as popular ensembles featured members who were proudly homosexual.

I desired his lean physique and defined hairstyle, his angular jaw and male chest. I aimed to personify the Berlin-era Bowie

During the nineties, I passed my days operating a motorcycle and dressing like a tomboy, but I reverted back to traditional womanhood when I chose to get married. My spouse moved our family to the America in 2007, but when our relationship dissolved I felt an irresistible pull revisiting the manhood I had earlier relinquished.

Considering that no artist challenged norms to the extent of David Bowie, I chose to use some leisure time during a seasonal visit visiting Britain at the V&A, hoping that possibly he could provide clarity.

I was uncertain specifically what I was searching for when I walked into the exhibition - perhaps I hoped that by losing myself in the extravagance of Bowie's norm-challenging expression, I might, in turn, stumble across a insight into my true nature.

I soon found myself standing in front of a modest display where the visual presentation for "the iconic song" was continuously looping. Bowie was strutting his stuff in the primary position, looking polished in a dark grey suit, while off to one side three backing singers dressed in drag crowded round a microphone.

Unlike the performers I had seen personally, these ladies failed to move around the stage with the self-assurance of born divas; rather they looked bored and annoyed. Relegated to the background, they had gum in their mouths and rolled their eyes at the tedium of it all.

"Boys keep swinging, boys always work it out," Bowie voiced happily, appearing ignorant to their diminished energy. I felt a fleeting feeling of empathy for the supporting artists, with their pronounced make-up, awkward hairpieces and too-tight dresses.

They gave the impression of as ill-at-ease as I did in female clothing - irritated and impatient, as if they were hoping for it all to end. At the moment when I recognized my alignment with three men dressed in drag, one of them ripped off her wig, wiped the makeup from her face, and showed herself to be ... Bowie! Revelation. (Of course, there were two other David Bowies as well.)

Right then, I knew for certain that I desired to remove everything and transform like Bowie. I craved his slender frame and his sharp haircut, his strong features and his male chest; I sought to become the lean-figured, Bowie's German period. Nevertheless I couldn't, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would need to be a man.

Declaring myself as homosexual was a different challenge, but gender transition was a significantly scarier prospect.

It took me further time before I was willing. In the meantime, I did my best to become more masculine: I stopped wearing makeup and eliminated all my feminine garments, shortened my locks and commenced using male attire.

I altered how I sat, walked differently, and changed my name and pronouns, but I stopped short of hormonal treatment - the potential for denial and regret had rendered me immobile with anxiety.

After the David Bowie show concluded its international run with a engagement in Brooklyn, New York, after half a decade, I returned. I had reached a breaking point. I was unable to continue acting to be a person I wasn't.

Positioned before the identical footage in 2018, I knew for certain that the problem wasn't about my clothing, it was my body. I didn't identify as a butch female; I was a male with feminine qualities who'd been presenting artificially since birth. I desired to change into the person in the polished attire, moving in the illumination, and then I comprehended that I was able to.

I scheduled an appointment to see a doctor not long after. It took additional years before my transformation concluded, but not a single concern I feared occurred.

I still have many of my female characteristics, so others regularly misinterpret me for a queer man, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I sought the ability to explore expression following Bowie's example - and given that I'm at peace with myself, I can.