Captain Cat Burton always knew she wanted to be a pilot after her father took her in a jet fighter when she was just six months old. She also wanted to live her life as a woman but that dream took much longer to realise. Cat, who worked for British Airways for 45 years, said coming out as trans to her colleagues when she was 58 was the “hardest thing she’s ever done”. She is now calling for more training for doctors so that they are better able to deal with people who are transitioning, especially older people. Cat said she took four months off work, living permanently as a woman, before realising she could not go back as her “old self”. “I liken it to stepping off a cliff in pitch darkness – and then finding out the cliff is only two inches high,” she said.