I Believed I Was a Gay Woman - David Bowie Enabled Me to Realize the Reality

During 2011, a few years before the acclaimed David Bowie display launched at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in the UK capital, I publicly announced a gay woman. Previously, I had solely pursued relationships with men, one of whom I had married. Two years later, I found myself nearing forty-five, a newly single caregiver to four kids, residing in the America.

At that time, I had commenced examining both my personal gender and attraction preferences, searching for understanding.

I entered the world in England during the early 1970s - prior to digital connectivity. As teenagers, my companions and myself didn't have Reddit or video sharing sites to turn to when we had curiosities about intimacy; instead, we looked to music icons, and throughout the eighties, musicians were challenging gender norms.

The Eurythmics singer donned boys' clothes, The Culture Club frontman embraced girls' clothes, and bands such as well-known groups featured performers who were openly gay.

I desired his narrow hips and sharp haircut, his strong features and flat chest. I aimed to personify the artist's German phase

During the nineties, I passed my days driving a bike and dressing like a tomboy, but I returned to traditional womanhood when I opted for marriage. My husband relocated us to the US in 2007, but when the union collapsed I felt an undeniable attraction back towards the manhood I had previously abandoned.

Given that no one challenged norms to the extent of David Bowie, I opted to use some leisure time during a summer trip visiting Britain at the V&A, hoping that maybe he could provide clarity.

I was uncertain precisely what I was searching for when I walked into the display - possibly I anticipated that by losing myself in the opulence of Bowie's norm-challenging expression, I might, consequently, stumble across a hint about my personal self.

Quickly I discovered myself positioned before a compact monitor where the film clip for "Boys Keep Swinging" was continuously looping. Bowie was performing confidently in the primary position, looking sharp in a charcoal outfit, while positioned laterally three backing singers wearing women's clothing crowded round a microphone.

In contrast to the performers I had seen personally, these female-presenting individuals weren't sashaying around the stage with the self-assurance of born divas; rather they looked disinterested and irritated. Placed in secondary positions, they were chewing and rolled their eyes at the monotony of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie performed brightly, apparently oblivious to their reduced excitement. I felt a fleeting feeling of understanding for the backing singers, with their thick cosmetics, awkward hairpieces 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. At the moment when I realized I was identifying with three individuals presenting as female, one of them ripped off her wig, smeared the lipstick from her face, and unveiled herself as ... Bowie! Surprise. (Of course, there were further David Bowies as well.)

In that instant, I became completely convinced that I desired to rip it all off and become Bowie too. I wanted his lean physique and his defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and his masculine torso; I aimed to personify the slender-shaped, Bowie's German period. However I couldn't, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would require being a man.

Announcing my identity as gay was a different challenge, but personal transformation was a much more frightening prospect.

It took me additional years before I was ready. Meanwhile, I tried my hardest to embrace manhood: I stopped wearing makeup and threw away all my women's clothing, shortened my locks and began donning men's clothes.

I changed my seating posture, changed my stride, and modified my personal references, but I paused at 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 engagement in Brooklyn, New York, five years later, I returned. I had arrived at a crisis. I couldn't go on pretending to be a person I wasn't.

Standing in front of the same video in 2018, I was absolutely sure that the issue didn't involve my attire, it was my physical form. I wasn't a masculine woman; I was a man with gentle characteristics who'd been in costume throughout his existence. I wanted to transform myself into the person in the polished attire, performing under lights, and now I realized that I was able to.

I made arrangements to see a doctor soon after. It took further time before my transformation concluded, but none of the fears I worried about came true.

I still have many of my traditional womanly traits, so others regularly misinterpret me for a gay man, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I desired the liberty to explore expression like Bowie did - and given that I'm at peace with myself, I am able to.