Rachel Walters is a woman who bloomed beautifully, even if later than she might have imagined. Approaching her 70th birthday, she reflects on a journey of quiet discovery and courage, one that truly began in 2012 after she took early retirement. Though the path to living as her authentic self crept up slowly, it was a journey rooted in a lifetime of feeling different, of secret moments spent slipping into her mother’s and sister’s clothes as a child, finding joy and comfort in those small acts of self-expression. Rachel has long been part of the trans community in the west and south of England, moving gracefully from one support group to another, offering guidance and warmth to those just beginning their own transitions, and cherishing the deep friendships she has built along the way. She does not seek the spotlight, yet her presence is radiant and visible, a testament to living openly and unapologetically. Her professional life began in the disciplined world of the Navy, where her civilian roles allowed brief escapes for self-discovery and freedom. Alongside work, Rachel navigated the challenges of life with quiet strength: a marriage that ended, raising two children on her own, and finding new purpose in unexpected places.
Joining her local Search and Rescue Team just before retirement became a turning point, and she embraced her identity fully while serving, stepping into leadership and carving a place for herself among a few other trans women in UK SAR. Even after stepping back due to family matters and illness, her passion and resilience brought her back to the team, stronger and more grounded than ever. Beyond SAR, Rachel’s gentle leadership extends to the NHS Leadership Academy, her local Police Independent Advisory Group, and she is also deeply involved in trans advocacy, contributing to Translucent.org.uk by conducting research and gathering information and evidence to support others in the community. In addition, she is an active member of the Beaumont Society and GIRES, as well as several LGBTQ research groups, using her experience and insight to help shape understanding, policy, and support for trans and gender-diverse people. She finds joy in simple pleasures too, wandering the countryside with her rambling group, yet always keeping her heart tuned to the needs of her community. Rachel Walters is a woman who has lived courageously, loved deeply, and continues to embrace life with openness, grace, and a quiet, enduring strength.
Monika: Hello Rachel, welcome to my blog. I am so happy that you have accepted my invitation.
Rachel: Hi Monika, thank you so much for asking me to contribute to your blog.
Monika: You are a woman of many talents. You’ve raised children, navigated a career, and transitioned publicly. Looking back, what are you most proud of?
Rachel: It has to be raising my children and keeping our family together. My children were 10 and 8 when my marriage split. I won’t go into the details, but they chose to live with me. I was fully committed to them. I felt that I was in a better position to provide stability than their mother, so despite having a full-time job, I was determined to prioritize them, putting my own life on hold in the process.
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| "I thought transitioning was impossible." |
Rachel: Pinning it down is not easy. When I was very young, I just saw myself as a boy, but I always wanted to imagine myself as a girl. I didn’t know why back then. Around the age of 10 or 11, I had this inquisitive drive to try on my mum’s clothes and shoes, or when undressed, I would often ‘tuck’ just to see what I looked like without a penis.
This was in the mid-1960s, and somehow I just knew that what I was doing wouldn’t be accepted. Still, I continued whenever I had the chance, even if it was only for a few minutes. As I got into my teens, my parents were often out, leaving me at home alone more, which gave me more opportunities. I didn’t specifically know about trans people at that time. There were pantomime dames and principal boys, but they were obviously performing, and comedians doing drag on TV were not relatable to me. There were occasional drag performers on variety shows, but none I could identify with. My friendship group was generally mixed boys and girls from the local neighborhood.
Monika: It sounds like your sense of difference grew stronger during adolescence.
Rachel: As adolescence progressed, my friends all started getting girlfriends, and my younger sister had a few friends too. But for some reason, I didn’t seem to fancy anyone like everyone else. I just had a feeling I now think of as jealousy or envy. I wanted to be like them, but how could I?
By age 14 or 15, puberty was in full swing. I grew fast and started growing a lot of hair. Not knowing any better, I felt stuck in my body. How could I ever be a girl? I was muscly and hairy. I did all sorts of sports at school, football, badminton, athletics, all the field events, plus sprinting.
Monika: When did you first learn that transitioning was even possible?
Rachel: Still in my mid-teens, I started an engineering apprenticeship. This was really when I discovered the existence of transsexuals through glossy magazines, newspapers, and a few news items on TV. By then, I assumed it was impossible for me; I didn’t see myself ever being able to be like them. But I continued to dress in my mum and sisters’ clothes whenever I could, and shoes were always a problem, so I improvised. I made wedges to fit inside my mum’s heels so I could wear them without crushing the backs or getting caught. Later, I made my own ‘sandals’ with high block heels and hid them away. It was a secret, but it felt essential.
Monika: Do you feel your marriage was, in some ways, an attempt to escape from yourself or the feelings you were carrying at the time?
Rachel: Yes. I wanted to conform, but I’d only ever had a few relationships, if they could be called that. At age 21, I went out for a short while with one of my friendship group, the younger sister of a close friend. I think she was 17 at the time. I was clumsy and didn’t know what I was doing, and she eventually found someone else in the group more interesting. They eventually married, and still are.
Monika: Did that leave you feeling frustrated or more unsure about yourself?
Rachel: Definitely. Then there was another, a friend of the one who dumped me, but it didn’t last more than a few weeks. In my mid-20s, I went out with an old neighbor. She was a tomboy and wasn’t interested in fashion, but had a body to die for. I still didn’t understand myself at the time. We’d get intimate, but no sex, my choice. Years later, I found out she is a lesbian. In hindsight, I think I wanted to be her, and for her to fit the role I expected.
In my late teens and early twenties, I continued to dress at home whenever I had the chance to be alone. I nearly got caught a few times, but I didn’t. My sister told me that when I was younger, probably in my early teens, she had seen me wearing one of my mum’s leotards at her friend’s house across the street, but she didn’t say anything at the time.
When I was 26, I purchased my first house and left my parents’ nest. Within days, I had ordered some shoes and clothes by mail. There was an immediate drive to get and wear the clothes. I didn’t look presentable, but I just had to do it.
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| "In February 2014, I attended my first support group." |
Rachel: My late 20s were not a great time. I had a good job, earning well above the average wage, but in hindsight, I was lost, probably quite severely depressed, lonely, and dysphoric.
I used to frequent a local pub and would be there most evenings, finding solace at the bottom of a glass. I was introduced to my soon-to-be wife by a mutual friend. I was flattered, and she basically seduced me. Within weeks, everything went wrong, she was rushed to hospital with an ectopic pregnancy. She almost died, and they had to operate urgently. Being the ethical and caring person I am, I stayed with her.
Monika: Did you feel pressured to stay with her, or was it more about your own sense of responsibility?
Rachel: She wanted me, and I was almost 30 with no other relationship prospects. I thought I loved her. Most of my friends and all my family didn’t like her, but what better offer was I going to get? We decided to marry and did so the following year. My best friend even tried to talk me out of it the day before. Was it an escape? Yes, I think it was. I was trying to conform, like everyone else.
We had been arguing, mainly over a tight budget, and our sex life was almost non-existent. I didn’t expect the situation that came next. We had moved because of my job, about 150 miles from our previous home, but she didn’t settle. Eventually, it turned out she was having an affair and got pregnant. I believed I could do as good a job, if not better, raising my children. My son wanted to stay with me, and my daughter also chose to stay with us. I fought to keep them, and won in court, although it was uncontested.
Monika: How did you cope with the financial and logistical pressures of being a single parent?
Rachel: Well, I was a single parent with two children, ages 10 and 8, and my nearest relative was three hours away. I needed my job to keep everything going, but the income wasn’t quite enough. I borrowed against my house to stay afloat and used a childminder to cover after-school hours. With little flexibility at work, I took a sideways move to a job that didn’t require much traveling. It halted my career progression, but I had no choice.
Despite the challenges, there were upsides. Every month, I took the children to see their mum if they wanted to go, my son didn’t for a couple of years. My parents live only a few miles away so I stayed with them when I visited the area. Over time, a pattern developed where the children stayed with their mum for long weekends or part of school holidays, giving me the chance to go home and be myself, Rachel, for a few days.
Monika: But you still couldn’t fully come out then, right? How did that feel?
Rachel: I still couldn’t come out fully. I worried it might affect custody of the children, or even my job, since I was paranoid about it affecting my security clearance.
Monika: You spent many years as a civilian working for the Navy. What was it like to live in such a disciplined and structured environment?
Rachel: Although I worked with the Navy and later other military services, I wasn’t under the same discipline, as I was a Civil Servant and employed by the civilian side of the Ministry. Back when I started my apprenticeship in the early 1970s, being LGBT was not acceptable. I knew that if I were ‘found out’, whether caught dressing or even looking at LGBT material, I’d either be ridiculed or hounded out.
By the time I changed roles and took a post in London, on promotion into a different specialism, in 1983, there were a couple of ‘gay’ colleagues, but they were not officially out. It was a matter of keeping my head down and staying in the closet. Later, after a post move to Bath in 1995, I discovered there was a trans woman working at a site across the city. Hearing some of the comments, I realized it would be difficult for me to come out. How would it affect my family life and career?
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| "I don’t think I’ve ever said it in such clear terms as “I’m going to transition,” it just happened." |
Monika: Did you feel trapped by all those responsibilities and societal expectations?
Rachel: I still thought transitioning was impossible. I was married, overweight, thinning-haired, and still covered in thick dark body hair, my wife didn’t suspect either and I didn’t know how she would react. By 1998, I was a single parent who needed job security. In my last few years at work, I believe the Civil Service would have supported me, but it would have required a binary change. Go home, and return a few days later changing from my old name and presentation to Rachel/woman, and at that time, I wasn’t able to do that. I also worried: if I came out, would I lose my children? For me, it was still an impossibility.
Monika: What do you think was the moment, or the trigger, that made you realize it was finally time to start your transition and live as your true self?
Rachel: Looking back, I don’t think there was a single moment. There were a number of opportunities over the years. In 1983, for example, I could have left the Civil Service to work on an oil platform in the North Sea. But I couldn’t see it ending well if I were found out while stuck out on a rig for weeks at a time, in an environment full of men. When my marriage ended, I could have lost custody of my children and probably my house. In that situation, I would have had nothing to lose. But I still didn’t take that step, as I had commitments to my children.
Monika: How did your career factor into your decision?
Rachel: In the late 2000s, my children were gaining independence, and a few colleagues of my generation were taking early retirement packages. I needed a way out of my career, so I spent a few years planning a different future, considering electrical contracting or consultancy (planning and implementing communications/IT projects). I also had some rare specialist skills from my early career that I had to downgrade or remove from my staff record to make the transition easier.
In 2011, there was an initiative to reduce staff through an early severance package. Having reduced my skills on record, I applied and just scraped through the sift. The package included conversion to early retirement with a full works pension. By 2012, I was officially ‘retired’ on my 56th birthday. Both my children had flown the nest, and I was at home alone.
Monika: And that’s when you started exploring your identity more seriously?
Rachel: Yes. I was still in the closet, but I was dressed/presenting as Rachel a good proportion of the time. I had planned to come out as ‘a crossdresser’ in February 2013, when my dad suddenly passed away from a heart attack. It didn’t feel right to come out then.
Later that year, I went into a local fish and chip shop. In the corner was a tall young woman waiting for her order, and I thought I recognized her. I went to my car in one direction and she left a few seconds later in the opposite direction, walking up the road and her heels, making a clip-clop sound. It made me think. A little research later confirmed who they were, a local gender nonconforming art student and fashion model and having recently been featured in the local newspaper. (note: 12 years on, the person now identifies as gay and works as a professional drag queen)
END OF PART 1
All photos: courtesy of Rachel Walters.
© 2026 - Monika Kowalska
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