I Thought Myself to Be a Homosexual Woman - The Music Icon Made Me Realize the Actual Situation

In 2011, a couple of years before the acclaimed David Bowie show debuted at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I declared myself a lesbian. Up to that point, I had exclusively dated men, including one I had entered matrimony with. Two years later, I found myself approaching middle age, a freshly divorced mother of four, living in the United States.

During this period, I had started questioning both my sense of self and romantic inclinations, seeking out clarity.

I entered the world in England during the early 1970s - before the internet. During our youth, my companions and myself didn't have social platforms or YouTube to consult when we had questions about sex; rather, we turned toward music icons, and during the 80s, artists were challenging gender norms.

The Eurythmics singer sported masculine attire, The Culture Club frontman wore girls' clothes, and musical acts such as Erasure and Bronski Beat featured members who were publicly out.

I wanted his slender frame and defined hairstyle, his angular jaw and male chest. I sought to become the Berlin-era Bowie

Throughout the 90s, I passed my days riding a motorbike and adopting masculine styles, but I returned to traditional womanhood when I chose to get married. My husband relocated us to the United States in 2007, but when our relationship dissolved I felt an powerful draw revisiting the masculinity I had once given up.

Since nobody experimented with identity quite like David Bowie, I chose to use some leisure time during a seasonal visit back to the UK at the V&A, with the expectation that possibly he could help me figure it out.

I lacked clarity precisely what I was seeking when I walked into the display - possibly I anticipated that by immersing myself in the richness of Bowie's identity exploration, I might, in turn, discover a clue to my own identity.

Before long I was facing a modest display where the music video for "Boys Keep Swinging" was recurring endlessly. Bowie was performing confidently in the foreground, looking stylish in a charcoal outfit, while off to one side three supporting vocalists dressed in drag gathered around a microphone.

Differing from the drag queens I had seen personally, these female-presenting individuals failed to move around the stage with the self-assurance of inherent stars; instead they looked disinterested and irritated. Positioned as supporting acts, they had gum in their mouths and rolled their eyes at the monotony of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie voiced happily, seemingly unaware to their lack of enthusiasm. I felt a fleeting feeling of understanding for the backing singers, with their heavy makeup, uncomfortable wigs and restrictive outfits.

They gave the impression of as ill-at-ease as I did in women's clothes - irritated and impatient, as if they were yearning for it all to end. Just as I realized I was identifying with three individuals presenting as female, one of them tore off her wig, removed the cosmetics from her face, and unveiled herself as ... Bowie! Shocker. (Understandably, there were further David Bowies as well.)

Right then, I was absolutely sure that I desired to shed all constraints and become Bowie too. I wanted his lean physique and his defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and his masculine torso; I wanted to embody the slender-shaped, artist's Berlin phase. Nevertheless I couldn't, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would have to become a man.

Announcing my identity as queer 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 embrace manhood: I ceased using cosmetics and discarded all my women's clothing, shortened my locks and commenced using men's clothes.

I changed my seating posture, walked differently, and modified my personal references, but I stopped short of medical intervention - the potential for denial and remorse had caused me to freeze with apprehension.

After the David Bowie display concluded its international run with a engagement in New York City, after half a decade, I returned. I had arrived at a crisis. I was unable to continue acting to be an identity that didn't fit.

Positioned before the identical footage in 2018, I was absolutely sure that the problem wasn't about my clothing, it was my body. I wasn't simply a tomboy; I was a feminine man who'd been wearing drag throughout his existence. I aimed to transition into the individual in the stylish outfit, moving in the illumination, and then I comprehended that I could.

I made arrangements to see a physician not long after. The process required further time before my transformation concluded, but none of the fears I feared materialized.

I continue to possess many of my feminine mannerisms, so individuals frequently misidentify me for a gay man, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I sought the ability to experiment with identity like Bowie did - and now that I'm content with my physical form, I can.