I Thought That I Identified As a Lesbian - The Music Icon Made Me Uncover the Truth

Back in 2011, a few years ahead of the acclaimed David Bowie display opened at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in the UK capital, I publicly announced a lesbian. Until that moment, I had solely pursued relationships with men, with one partner I had entered matrimony with. Two years later, I found myself approaching middle age, a freshly divorced parent to four children, making my home in the America.

During this period, I had begun to doubt both my gender identity and sexual orientation, seeking out clarity.

My birthplace was England during the early 1970s - before the internet. During our youth, my friends and I didn't have online forums or YouTube to turn to when we had questions about sex; rather, we turned toward music icons, and in that decade, musicians were challenging gender norms.

Annie Lennox sported masculine attire, The Culture Club frontman wore feminine outfits, and pop groups such as well-known groups featured performers who were proudly homosexual.

I desired his narrow hips and defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and male chest. I sought to become the artist's German phase

In that decade, I passed my days riding a motorbike and wearing androgynous clothing, but I returned to traditional womanhood when I chose to get married. My husband transferred our home to the United States in 2007, but when our relationship dissolved I felt an irresistible pull returning to the masculinity I had once given up.

Considering that no artist challenged norms as dramatically as David Bowie, I decided to devote an open day during a summer trip back to the UK at the V&A, hoping that maybe he could help me figure it out.

I didn't know exactly what I was looking for when I stepped inside the display - maybe I thought that by submerging my consciousness in the opulence of Bowie's gender experimentation, I might, as a result, discover a insight into my own identity.

Quickly I discovered myself positioned before a compact monitor where the visual presentation for "the iconic song" was continuously looping. Bowie was moving with assurance in the foreground, looking polished in a charcoal outfit, while positioned laterally three supporting vocalists in feminine attire gathered around a microphone.

Differing from the performers I had witnessed firsthand, these characters weren't sashaying around the stage with the confidence of inherent stars; rather they looked bored and annoyed. Placed in secondary positions, they chewed gum and showed impatience at the tedium of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie sang cheerfully, appearing ignorant to their diminished energy. I felt a fleeting feeling of connection for the backing singers, with their thick cosmetics, awkward hairpieces and constricting garments.

They appeared to feel as awkward as I did in feminine attire - irritated and impatient, as if they were longing for it all to end. At the moment when I recognized my alignment with three individuals presenting as female, one of them tore off her wig, wiped the makeup from her face, and unveiled herself as ... Bowie! Surprise. (Of course, there were further David Bowies as well.)

At that moment, I was absolutely sure that I desired to shed all constraints and become Bowie too. I wanted his narrow hips and his precise cut, his angular jaw and his flat chest; I wanted to embody the slender-shaped, artist's Berlin phase. However I found myself incapable, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would have to become a man.

Declaring myself as gay was a separate matter, but transitioning was a considerably more daunting outlook.

I required several more years before I was willing. During that period, I did my best to become more masculine: I ceased using cosmetics and eliminated all my feminine garments, shortened my locks and started wearing male attire.

I sat differently, walked differently, and changed my name and pronouns, but I stopped short of hormonal treatment - the potential for denial and remorse had left me paralysed with fear.

After the David Bowie show concluded its international run with a presentation in the American metropolis, five years later, I revisited. I had arrived at a crisis. I found it impossible to maintain the facade to be a person I wasn't.

Standing in front of the familiar clip in 2018, I knew for certain that the issue wasn't about my clothing, it was my physical form. I wasn't a masculine woman; I was a man with gentle characteristics who'd been in costume since birth. I desired to change into the man in the sharp suit, performing under lights, and then I comprehended that I could.

I scheduled an appointment to see a physician not long after. It took further time before my transition was complete, but none of the things I anticipated materialized.

I continue to possess many of my feminine mannerisms, so individuals frequently misidentify me for a homosexual male, but I accept this. I desired the liberty to experiment with identity as Bowie had - and given that I'm comfortable in my body, I can.