I Was Convinced Myself to Be a Gay Woman - The Music Icon Helped Me Discover the Truth

Back in 2011, several years prior to the renowned David Bowie exhibition launched at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in England, I declared myself a lesbian. Up to that point, I had exclusively dated men, including one I had entered matrimony with. By 2013, I found myself nearing forty-five, a newly single parent to four children, making my home in the United States.

During this period, I had started questioning both my sense of self and sexual orientation, searching for answers.

I entered the world in England during the dawn of the seventies era - before the internet. When we were young, my companions and myself were without Reddit or YouTube to reference when we had questions about sex; instead, we looked to music icons, and throughout the eighties, artists were experimenting with gender norms.

The iconic vocalist wore male clothing, The Culture Club frontman adopted feminine outfits, and musical acts such as well-known groups featured members who were publicly out.

I wanted his slender frame and sharp haircut, his strong features and male chest. I aimed to personify the Berlin-era Bowie

Throughout the 90s, I spent my time operating a motorcycle and adopting masculine styles, but I returned to conventional female presentation when I opted for marriage. My partner relocated us to the America in 2007, but when our relationship dissolved I felt an powerful draw returning to the male identity I had previously abandoned.

Since nobody played with gender quite like David Bowie, I opted to use some leisure time during a warm-weather journey back to the UK at the museum, anticipating that perhaps he could help me figure it out.

I lacked clarity precisely what I was looking for when I walked into the exhibition - maybe I thought that by submerging my consciousness in the extravagance of Bowie's gender experimentation, I might, as a result, stumble across a insight into my personal self.

Quickly I discovered myself positioned before a modest display where the visual presentation for "the iconic song" was recurring endlessly. Bowie was performing confidently in the foreground, looking sharp in a dark grey suit, while to the side three accompanying performers in feminine attire crowded round a microphone.

Unlike the entertainers I had seen personally, these characters weren't sashaying around the stage with the poise of inherent stars; instead they looked disinterested and irritated. Placed in secondary positions, they chewed gum and showed impatience at the boredom of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie voiced happily, seemingly unaware to their reduced excitement. I felt a momentary pang of empathy for the accompanying performers, with their thick cosmetics, uncomfortable wigs and constricting garments.

They seemed to experience as awkward as I did in female clothing - irritated and impatient, as if they were yearning for it all to end. Just as I understood I connected with three individuals presenting as female, one of them ripped off her wig, smeared the lipstick from her face, and showed herself to be ... Bowie! Shocker. (Understandably, there were two other David Bowies as well.)

Right then, I became completely convinced that I desired to rip it all off and become Bowie too. I craved his slender frame and his defined hairstyle, his strong features and his flat chest; I aimed to personify the lean-figured, artist's Berlin phase. Nevertheless I was unable to, because to authentically transform into Bowie, first I would have to become a man.

Declaring myself as homosexual was one thing, but transitioning was a considerably more daunting possibility.

I required further time before I was prepared. In the meantime, I made every effort to embrace manhood: I ceased using cosmetics and eliminated all my women's clothing, shortened my locks and started wearing male attire.

I changed my seating posture, changed my stride, and adopted new identifiers, but I paused at medical intervention - the possibility of rejection and remorse had left me paralysed with fear.

When the David Bowie exhibition finished its world tour with a stint in Brooklyn, New York, after half a decade, I went back. I had arrived at a crisis. I couldn't go on pretending to be something I was not.

Standing in front of the same video in 2018, I became completely convinced that the issue wasn't my clothes, it was my biological self. I wasn't simply a tomboy; I was a man with gentle characteristics who'd been wearing drag throughout his existence. I desired to change into the person in the polished attire, dancing in the spotlight, and at that moment I understood that I had the capacity to.

I booked myself in to see a physician shortly afterwards. It took additional years before my transformation concluded, but not a single concern I worried about occurred.

I maintain many of my female characteristics, so others regularly misinterpret me for a gay man, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I desired the liberty to explore expression following Bowie's example - and since I'm at peace with myself, I have that capacity.