I Was Convinced I Was a Homosexual Woman - The Music Icon Enabled Me to Realize the Actual Situation

During 2011, a few years before the celebrated David Bowie exhibition launched at the renowned Victoria and Albert Museum in England, I came out as a homosexual woman. Up to that point, I had only been with men, with one partner I had entered matrimony with. Two years later, I found myself nearing forty-five, a freshly divorced mother of four, making my home in the US.

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

Born in England during the early 1970s - pre-world wide web. As teenagers, my friends and I lacked access to social platforms or YouTube to turn to when we had questions about sex; rather, we turned toward music icons, and throughout the eighties, artists were challenging gender norms.

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

I wanted his narrow hips and defined hairstyle, his defined jawline and flat chest. I wanted to embody the Berlin-era Bowie

Throughout the 90s, I passed my days operating a motorcycle and adopting masculine styles, but I returned to traditional womanhood when I opted for marriage. My partner relocated us to the United States in 2007, but when the union collapsed I felt an powerful draw revisiting the masculinity I had once given up.

Considering that no artist played with gender quite like David Bowie, I chose to use some leisure time during a warm-weather journey visiting Britain at the V&A, with the expectation that perhaps he could guide my understanding.

I was uncertain precisely what I was searching for when I walked into the exhibition - maybe I thought that by losing myself in the opulence of Bowie's norm-challenging expression, I might, as a result, encounter a clue to my own identity.

Before long I was positioned before a compact monitor where the music video for "the iconic song" was recurring endlessly. Bowie was moving with assurance in the primary position, looking stylish in a charcoal outfit, while positioned laterally three supporting vocalists in feminine attire gathered around a microphone.

Unlike the drag queens I had witnessed firsthand, these characters didn't glide around the stage with the self-assurance of natural performers; instead they looked bored and annoyed. Relegated to the background, they chewed gum and rolled their eyes at the tedium of it all.

"Those words, boys always work it out," Bowie sang cheerfully, seemingly unaware to their reduced excitement. I felt a brief sensation of understanding for the backing singers, with their heavy makeup, ill-fitting wigs and constricting garments.

They gave the impression of as ill-at-ease as I did in feminine attire - frustrated and eager, as if they were hoping for it all to be over. Precisely 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! Revelation. (Of course, there were further David Bowies as well.)

Right then, I was absolutely sure that I wanted to shed all constraints and transform like Bowie. I desired his narrow hips and his defined hairstyle, his strong features and his masculine torso; I wanted to embody the lean-figured, Berlin-era Bowie. Nevertheless I found myself incapable, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would require being a man.

Declaring myself as queer was one thing, but gender transition was a much more frightening prospect.

It took me additional years before I was willing. Meanwhile, I did my best to adopt male characteristics: I ceased using cosmetics and eliminated all my skirts and dresses, shortened my locks and commenced using male attire.

I altered how I sat, walked differently, and adopted new identifiers, but I paused at surgical procedures - the potential for denial and remorse had caused me to freeze with apprehension.

When the David Bowie display concluded its international run with a stint in New York City, five years later, I went back. I had experienced a turning point. I couldn't go on pretending to be a person I wasn't.

Facing the same video in 2018, I knew for certain that the issue wasn't about my clothing, it was my biological self. I didn't identify as a butch female; I was a feminine man who'd been wearing drag all his life. I wanted to transform myself into the person in the polished attire, performing under lights, and at that moment I understood that I could.

I scheduled an appointment to see a physician not long after. It took another few years before my transition was complete, but none of the fears I worried about occurred.

I maintain many of my female characteristics, so people often mistake me for a homosexual male, but I'm OK with that. I desired the liberty to explore expression following Bowie's example - and given that I'm comfortable in my body, I can.