Burlesque performer Rudy Jeevanjee is such a tease

Normally seen wielding a whip on stage, burlesque performer Rudy Jeevanjee cracks down on toxic thoughts and self- destructive behaviour, and talks about learning to love yourself

Ilove to give audiences the full fantasy. My signature looks tend to have a traditional African or Asian touch, and more often than not I want to capture the feeling of a beautiful, ethereal, regal deity, radiating something calm and sensual, yet strong and whimsical.

Although I have never really identified as a “drag queen”, the art of drag was my first love when I was growing up. One of my inspirations and references is the work of

Kim Aviance, a non- gender- conforming, transappearing entity. At the time I had little or no knowledge of chosen gender identity, or what being trans was, but watching them felt right.

I remember coming across a video of Kim performing in 2006, when I was in my late teens, and I was entranced by their beauty and seductiveness: the twisting and turning, flouncing and bouncing of their dancing and powerful struts. I’d dance around my bedroom with a t- shirt on my head pretending it was a wig.

In the deep corners of my mind, I knew there was this innate desire to express a love and pride for my body as Kim was doing.

My debut burlesque performance was in November 2017, a couple of months before my 30th birthday. I was watching a BBC3 series called Queer Britain and one of the episodes focused exclusively on people of colour in the queer community, and the Cocoa Butter Club was featured.

I was immediately drawn to what this collective of performers was about and what it stood for, and it felt as if this was my chance to pursue my dreams in a space where my body, my colour and my sexuality would be accepted and celebrated.

I contacted the club’s founder, Sadie Sinner, and was booked in for a show.

I’ll never forget it. It was the most nervewracking and thrilling experience of my life and I realised that all those negative thoughts, that, for years, had been telling me I wasn’t good enough, weren’t true.

We are conditioned to think a particular way about beauty and about our bodies and are often made to feel something is wrong with us if we happen to think differently. This way of thinking wasn’t sitting right with me: I was living a life I thought I should be living, not the life I wanted to be living.

To begin this journey to appreciating and loving myself, I had to recalibrate and undertook a major shift in mind and body.

I ended a long- term relationship, withdrew from friends and family for a while — years, to be honest — and started to exercise, eat healthier and proceeded to rebuild. By avoiding outside influences, I took the time to listen to myself; there is nothing more powerful than the belief you have in yourself.

However, I haven’t always been my own biggest cheerleader.

For the most part I had a decent childhood, but from the age of eight or nine I started to put on more and more weight, and soon started to struggle to feel comfortable with my heavy- set self.

Despite having friends and being quite happy in school, I hated my body and how I looked, especially at a time when your differences are becoming more apparent and being highlighted among your peers.

The toxic thoughts would emerge, and I’d often run a mental list of all the things that were “wrong” with me: too black. Fat. Short. Closeted gay boy. I was trying to rationalise my undesirability. In particular, I despised my hips and thighs. They were so big and womanly and took away from the manly appearance I “should” have. It felt they were giving away my sexuality, which I didn’t like.

I had brief self- destructive moments as a young adult. Purging food was something that I did for a short time. It became a ritual I had to do as punishment for overeating, but it got to a point where my body was feeling much worse off afterwards, so I stopped. I also started to use skin- bleaching cream for areas of hyper- pigmentation – I was obsessed with having an even skin tone from head to toe.

After a couple of months of rubbing these foul- smelling chemicals over parts of my body and face, I took a moment, paused and thought: “What the fuck am I doing?”

Trying to bleach my skin was one of the most emotionally hurtful things I have done. It felt stupid and hypocritical, as if I was attempting to erase who I was.

Now, I embrace the many tones of my skin and the thickness of my body that I used to be in conflict with.

Performing has helped me become more at peace with my appearance as I’ve grown older. It’s taken a lot of time, but I’ve learnt to love my differences and see them as gifts.