I Was Convinced Myself to Be a Lesbian - The Legendary Artist Helped Me Discover the Truth

In 2011, a couple of years ahead of the acclaimed David Bowie exhibition launched at the famous Victoria and Albert Museum in London, I came out as a gay woman. Previously, I had solely pursued relationships with men, including one I had entered matrimony with. By 2013, I found myself approaching middle age, a newly single mother of four, residing in the United States.

At that time, I had commenced examining both my personal gender and romantic inclinations, looking to find answers.

Born in England during the dawn of the seventies era - pre-world wide web. During our youth, my friends and I lacked access to online forums or video sharing sites to turn to when we had questions about sex; rather, we looked to music icons, and in that decade, musicians were challenging gender norms.

Annie Lennox donned male clothing, The Culture Club frontman wore feminine outfits, and pop groups such as popular ensembles featured artists who were publicly out.

I wanted his narrow hips and sharp haircut, his defined jawline and masculine torso. I wanted to embody the Berlin-era Bowie

Throughout the 90s, I lived riding a motorbike and wearing androgynous clothing, but I reverted back to conventional female presentation when I opted for marriage. My husband moved our family to the America in 2007, but when the marriage ended I felt an powerful draw revisiting the male identity I had earlier relinquished.

Given that no one played with gender to the extent of David Bowie, I chose to spend a free afternoon during a seasonal visit back to the UK at the V&A, with the expectation that maybe he could help me figure it out.

I didn't know specifically what I was seeking when I entered the show - perhaps I hoped that by losing myself in the richness of Bowie's norm-challenging expression, I might, as a result, stumble across a hint about my personal self.

I soon found myself standing in front of a small television screen where the visual presentation for "that track" was recurring endlessly. Bowie was strutting his stuff in the foreground, looking polished in a dark grey suit, while to the side three supporting vocalists in feminine attire gathered around a microphone.

Differing from the performers I had witnessed firsthand, these ladies didn't glide around the stage with the self-assurance of born divas; conversely they looked unenthused and frustrated. Placed in secondary positions, they were chewing and showed impatience at the tedium of it all.

"Boys keep swinging, boys always work it out," Bowie performed brightly, appearing ignorant to their reduced excitement. I felt a brief sensation of empathy for the accompanying performers, with their thick cosmetics, awkward hairpieces and too-tight dresses.

They appeared to feel as uncomfortable as I did in female clothing - irritated and impatient, as if they were longing for it all to conclude. Precisely when I understood I connected with three men dressed in drag, one of them removed her wig, smeared the lipstick from her face, and unveiled herself as ... Bowie! Surprise. (Understandably, there were further David Bowies as well.)

In that instant, I became completely convinced that I desired to remove everything and transform like Bowie. I desired his narrow hips and his sharp haircut, his defined jawline and his masculine torso; I wanted to embody the lean-figured, Bowie's German period. Nevertheless I found myself incapable, because to genuinely embody Bowie, first I would need to be a man.

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

I needed further time before I was ready. In the meantime, I tried my hardest to become more masculine: I stopped wearing makeup and threw away all my women's clothing, trimmed my tresses and started wearing masculine outfits.

I sat differently, walked differently, and modified my personal references, but I halted before medical intervention - the potential for denial and regret had caused me to freeze with apprehension.

After the David Bowie show completed its global journey with a presentation in Brooklyn, New York, five years later, I revisited. I had arrived at a crisis. I found it impossible to maintain the facade to be something I was not.

Facing the identical footage in 2018, I was absolutely sure that the problem wasn't about my clothing, it was my physical form. I wasn't simply a tomboy; I was a feminine man who'd been presenting artificially since birth. I aimed to transition into the man in the sharp suit, dancing in the spotlight, and now I realized that I was able to.

I booked myself in to see a medical professional shortly afterwards. It took additional years before my personal journey finished, but none of the things I feared materialized.

I still have many of my feminine mannerisms, so people often mistake me for a homosexual male, but I'm comfortable with that outcome. I wanted the freedom to explore expression like Bowie did - and now that I'm content with my physical form, I can.