THE TRANSGENDER TOP GUN
He was the RAF hero who flew perilous missions in two wars and who dreamt of waking up as a woman. And when he became the first combatant to change sex, her biggest battle began. This is her amazing story...
WHEN I was a boy, sheltering in the cool shade of the house we had in Malaysia, I noticed a small dress in my parents’ bedroom, laid out on a bed framed by softly draped mosquito nets. I knew I just had to wear it, so I did...
Suddenly I heard: ‘Get out of here... Now!’ It was my father – a soldier in the Royal Artillery and the embodiment of the British Army macho culture – bellowing. ‘Get that off! If I ever catch you dressed like that again, I’ll send you to school in a dress, with ribbons in your hair, so all your friends will see. Do you understand!’
Had the offer been real, I would have delightedly accepted, but I knew answering back would only make matters worse. So from that moment on I lived a double life. Outwardly I was a boy who grew up to be an RAF navigator, holding my own among Top Gun crewmen and serving my country in Iraq and Afghanistan. Inwardly I was a girl who wanted to wear dresses and share secrets with my sister.
For 40 years I hid my real identity from my family and the military until I had no choice but to reveal my true colours – and became the first serving officer of the Armed Forces to embark on the journey of gender realignment… MOST of my childhood was spent wherever my father’s duty took him, from British military bases in the UK and Germany to western Malaysia. He had joined the Army as a 13-year-old boy soldier and was a big man in many ways. He was forthright in his views and heavily tattooed: one arm had a sword and a python while the other had a Bengal tiger and the badge of his Royal Artillery unit.
When I was born in the winter of 1959, he was overjoyed to have a son, but by the time I began infants’ school I was already confused.
Constantly living in the shadow of getting caught, I used to wear girls’ clothes underneath my boy clothes. I slipped into a nightie under my bedclothes. I wanted to confide in my sister Sandra, but feared she wouldn’t be able to keep my secret.
As I entered my teenage years, Dad retired from the Army and we moved to a council house on the Wirral. I was tall enough to fit Mum’s clothes and was delighted to discover she owned a wig, bras and high-heeled shoes, which I took to as if I was born to them.
Yet a manly career was expected of me, and in 1976, aged 16, I was accepted by the Glider School at RAF Sealand near my home. In the air, all my worries were forgotten – this is what would keep me alive.
Two years later, I began my officer training course at the Royal Air Force College in Cranwell, Lincolnshire. The RAF didn’t accept ‘gays’ but I knew I wasn’t a gay man, just one who was yet to find my place in society. I wasn’t a boy who liked wearing dresses; I was a girl with a man’s body.
My Forces family had placed me on a pedestal for flying fast jets as an officer at RAF Leuchars in Scotland. Revealing my secret would bring this all crashing down – and in particular, it would destroy Dad. I was trapped by my need to protect them from the disgrace I would surely bring.
My friends, meanwhile, began to notice that I didn’t have a girlfriend. On numerous occasions I was set up on a date, but I always found an excuse not to go, or I made sure there was no second date.
I enjoyed the company of girls, but I didn’t want a relationship with one. Neither did I want one with a man. My personal life was a disaster – and I did get caught out.
One day I undressed hastily to answer the door to a friend from my squadron. He stared at my shoulders as he spoke – and as soon as he had gone, I raced to the mirror and was horrified to see the red lines that were evidence that my bra straps had been too tight.
Then there was Sheelagh, a lovely Irish lady who was briefly my ‘girl- friend’. One night when I drove her home, she kissed me and suddenly her tongue was exploring my mouth. I was shocked and jumped back. She looked back at me, taken aback. We never kissed again.
By 1997 there was a lot of information about ‘transsexuality’ on the internet.
I was building up a better understanding that I wasn’t alone and booked an appointment at the Albany Gender Identity Clinic. After a chat with the doctor, I was a little surprised to be offered female hormones. It was a lifechanging prescription.
On October 28, 1998, I confided in my sister, Sandra.
‘I have some very important news to tell you,’ I said. ‘It is an exciting new chapter in my life and I want you to be with me for it.’ She interrupted: ‘Are you gay?’ ‘No, I’m not gay...’ I continued. ‘Is it a sex change?’ I told her how every night for the past 34 years, I had wished I would wake up a girl.
She somehow appeared totally unfazed, replying: ‘That’s OK, If that’s all it is, there’s no problem.
‘I love you and I will be there for you... I will help you through this. I’ve always wanted a sister, and now I have one, and it’s great!’
I had already decided my name: it was Caroline. I decided it would be best to offer my family some protection by changing my surname, so I wouldn’t bring attention, or ‘shame’, to them. It would be Paige.
Sandra agreed that telling the rest of the family wasn’t going to go well. Before that though, it was time to tell the military the truth. In February 1999, I made an appointment to see the senior medical officer, Katie Geary, and said: ‘I have been seeing a gender psychiatrist and have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. I have a letter from him here.’
She reached for a telephone. ‘Cancel all my appointments for the afternoon,’ she told her staff.
An anxious hour later, I was sum- moned back. Geary was angry. The Wing Commander in the RAF’s medical policy section had broken her request for confidentiality. He had already phoned my station commander, telling him he would ‘soon receive a request from someone to change sex – which should be ignored’. He had said ‘it was just a bloke who wanted to wear a dress, it was a phase he was going through that would be forgotten’.
The following day, the station commander invited me and Geary to his office. As I entered, he declared: ‘I wasn’t expecting it to be you!’ But he reassured me that the RAF was keen to keep me, and that he had been ‘given clearance from the very top, to do whatever I can to help you remain in service’.
I travelled north in early 1999 to see my family for what I knew could be the last time. I knew they would never be the same after what I had to tell them and that burden was difficult to carry.
My sister Sandra went ahead of me to break the news gently to my parents and my younger brothers Stan and Rich. Before I even arrived, my phone rang. It took all my strength to answer it.
‘Is this true? asked my father, ‘What Sandra has just told us?’
Mum thought I should have electric shock treatment
‘Yes,’ I replied softly, scared for what was about to come.
‘In which case, you are dead to us... Do you understand?’
‘Yes, I do... I’m sorry, I love you... Goodbye, Dad.’
I welled up with tears. It had gone exactly as I had feared.
An hour later the phone rang again. It was Sandra, who handed the phone to Dad. He was clearly upset, said he didn’t understand and admitted he couldn’t deal with it, but he didn’t want to expel me from the family.
Sandra told me the feeling in the family had been: what would their friends think of them? How could I do this to them? No one considered what I must have gone through or why I had held it back so long.
The following day I met my mum and spoke to her. ‘It’s so hard to take in, Dad gets really upset,’ she said. ‘He feels guilty that his comments in the past stopped you talking to us. We could have got you electric shock treatment.’
I knew it was time to leave. I never heard from Stan or Rich again.
I was now based at RAF Benson in Oxfordshire and it was agreed the best option for me was to move to a new base so I could transition into a woman with the least distur- bance to me and to my colleagues. I decided to move into private accommodation nearby. I was 39 and living full-time as Caroline, a woman. It was a day I never thought would come.
I returned to Cranwell to work at the Department of Recruitment and Selection, known as Doris. My new life was far from easy; rumours began to spread. Walking to breakfast in the officers’ mess one day, I stepped into a corridor behind two young officers. ‘Did you hear there’s an officer who’s had a sex change living here?’
‘Yes, I saw her the other day. She’s living in a caravan on the mess carpark... looks like a bloke.’
On the phone, I was called ‘Sir’ and saying my name was Caroline always raised questions, so I began to use ‘Caz’, a gender-free option, as my default name.
There was supposed to be a minimum of 12 months from formally beginning my transition to surgery. But when the surgeon’s office phoned to offer an earlier appointment, I leapt at the opportunity.
I woke up in the recovery room feeling cold. For days, I couldn’t see much more than bandages, but when I could, all I thought was that this was how my body should look. In 2001, I got the news that Dad had suffered a fatal heart attack. Sandra told me not to come home. A hostile reception awaited – though not from her. I got the impression they blamed me for his heart attack.
A paternal auntie had threatened to kill me if I went home. Then I was told I wasn’t welcome at his funeral either. Howw dare they! Dad would ld never have wanted that.
I believed he was slowly wly beginning to understand,and, even though he was the one ne in the family who was hurt rt the most. He had outspoken opinions, but he was a lovely man.an. Meanwhile those who couldn’t accept me were tearing apart the family he had made. Sadly, I had to organise my own private memorial ial service. Just me and a friend. .
By 2003, hostilities in Iraq raq had commenced. I was part of f a crew on RAF Merlin helicopters rs working with US Apache pilots. ots. The US crews never questioned ioned my gender. UK soldiers weren’t so free of prejudice. When I climbed in or out of the cockpit and walked past soldiers we were carrying, I would hear sniggers and muttered comments, like: ‘Don’t touch it, you’ll become one!’
As navigator I was in charge of planning and directing every flight into the desert, taking control of the helicopter if needed. Our job was to hunt down both insurgents and criminals, supporting troops on the ground. We were a flying 70ft target, so it would be crazy to say it wasn’t dangerous. It truly was. The threat was constantly evolving, the enemy was always seeking weaknesses in our defences, trying different techniques to shoot an aircraft down.
During one sortie to Basra Palace, once a holiday home for Saddam Hussein, a radio operator shouted out: ‘Palace Red, Red, Red, mortar attack in progress!’ Luckily we were already accelerating away into the darkness. During a tour of Afghanistan in 2008, Prince Harry was there too. Flying Apaches, he had escorted my aircraft on re-supply missions into some exposed bases. On the ground he mixed like any other aircrew – planning, briefing, resting and doing his job. We shared one problem, however. People would stare. For him, it was a stare of respect, of acknowledgment, of unveiled loyalty, and something to write home about. Stares at me were followed by muffled sniggers. Some would even laugh and point. On my 55th birthday, in 2014, I left the RAF. There was no ceremony or formal farewell. I was a civilian now, but I had worked to make the military more inclusive and it has gained from that. It was a proud moment. For my service in Iraq, Commander in Chief of Air Command awarded me his commendation for exceptional work. I was honoured. I wished I could have shown this to those outspoken denigrators who predicted that, as a transgender person, I would be a liability and not fit for operational service. I hoped Dad would have been proud too.
If this is true, you are dead to this family. Understand?
True Colours: My Life As The First Openly Transgender Officer In The British Armed Forces, by Caroline Paige, is published by Biteback on March 3, £17.99. Order your copy for £13.49 (25 per cent discount) until March 5 at www.mailbookshop.co.uk or call 0844 571 0640.