I Believed That I Identified As a Lesbian - The Music Icon Helped Me Realize the Reality

Back in 2011, a few years prior to the acclaimed David Bowie show debuted at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I publicly announced a gay woman. Previously, I had only been with men, with one partner I had wed. After a couple of years, I found myself in my early 40s, a newly single caregiver to four kids, living in the America.

During this period, I had commenced examining both my personal gender and romantic inclinations, looking to find answers.

My birthplace was England during the early 1970s - pre-world wide web. As teenagers, my companions and myself lacked access to Reddit or video sharing sites to reference when we had questions about sex; rather, we looked to pop stars, and throughout the eighties, everyone was experimenting with gender norms.

The Eurythmics singer sported masculine attire, The flamboyant singer adopted women's fashion, and pop groups such as well-known groups featured performers who were publicly out.

I wanted his lean physique and defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and flat chest. I sought to become the Berlin-era Bowie

During the nineties, I spent my time operating a motorcycle and adopting masculine styles, but I reverted back to femininity when I decided to wed. My partner moved our family to the United States in 2007, but when our relationship dissolved I felt an powerful draw returning to the male identity I had once given up.

Since nobody challenged norms to the extent of David Bowie, I decided to devote an open day during a summer trip visiting Britain at the V&A, anticipating that possibly he could help me figure it out.

I didn't know exactly what I was searching for when I walked into the exhibition - maybe I thought that by losing myself in the extravagance of Bowie's gender experimentation, I might, as a result, encounter a hint about my own identity.

Quickly I discovered myself facing a compact monitor where the music video for "that track" was recurring endlessly. Bowie was strutting his stuff in the foreground, looking sharp in a charcoal outfit, while off to one side three accompanying performers dressed in drag crowded round a microphone.

In contrast to the entertainers I had witnessed firsthand, these female-presenting individuals failed to move around the stage with the poise of natural performers; instead they looked bored and annoyed. Positioned as supporting acts, they chewed gum and expressed annoyance at the tedium of it all.

"The song's lyrics, boys always work it out," Bowie performed brightly, appearing ignorant to their reduced excitement. I felt a brief sensation of understanding for the supporting artists, with their heavy makeup, uncomfortable wigs and too-tight dresses.

They seemed to experience as uncomfortable as I did in feminine attire - annoyed and restless, as if they were yearning for it all to end. Precisely when I recognized my alignment with three men dressed in drag, one of them tore off her wig, wiped the makeup from her face, and unveiled herself as ... Bowie! Shocker. (Naturally, there were further David Bowies as well.)

In that instant, I knew for certain that I desired to rip it all off and emulate the artist. I desired his lean physique and his defined hairstyle, his angular jaw and his male chest; I aimed to personify the lean-figured, Berlin-era Bowie. And yet I couldn't, because to authentically transform into Bowie, first I would have to become a man.

Announcing my identity as homosexual was one thing, but gender transition was a much more frightening prospect.

I needed additional years before I was willing. Meanwhile, I did my best to adopt male characteristics: I ceased using cosmetics and threw away all my skirts and dresses, cut off my hair and began donning men's clothes.

I altered how I sat, walked differently, and changed my name and pronouns, but I paused at hormonal treatment - the chance of refusal and remorse had caused me to freeze with apprehension.

After the David Bowie exhibition finished its world tour with a engagement in the American metropolis, after half a decade, I returned. 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 knew for certain that the problem wasn't my clothes, it was my physical form. I wasn't a masculine woman; I was a man with gentle characteristics who'd been wearing drag all his life. I wanted to transform myself into the person in the polished attire, performing under lights, and now I realized that I had the capacity to.

I booked myself in to see a doctor soon after. I needed further time before my personal journey finished, but none of the fears I anticipated came true.

I still have many of my female characteristics, so people often mistake me for a homosexual male, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I sought the ability to play with gender as Bowie had - and now that I'm at peace with myself, I am able to.