Tiger Woods' Ex-Mistress Rachel Uchitel Fears Affair Will Follow Her to the 'Grave' as Scandal Affected Her Ability to 'Trust'

Rachel Uchitel isn't in denial over how her affair with Tiger Woods changed her life.

In a new interview, the pro-golfer's former mistress — who became a household name when the scandal was exposed in 2009 — expressed how the incident still affects her even after all these years.

“When you are in a conversation piece that big that everyone wants to talk about, it's going to go to your grave,” the 49-year-old shared, noting the incident has altered her ability to “trust.”

“Well, it's, it's affected my relationships, I have a very small world, I keep it that way. I don't really trust a lot of people because what I've been through is something that a lot of people cannot understand,” she expressed.

Uchitel’s world fell apart when Woods’ then-wife, Elin Nordegren, discovered their relationship. The podcaster and the decorated athlete originally met through their mutual friend Derek Jeter in Las Vegas in 2008.

Uchitel was then labeled a home-wrecker by the media and could not share her side of the story after signing an NDA for a $5 million payout.

“Listen, it's not like I don't know what people think of me. But I've spent the better part of 15 years trying to do something else that overshadows it,” she said in the interview.

“Clearly, that's a really hard thing to come back as the other woman. You don't get a lot of grace in that,” she added. “Obviously, my past is the reason that my name is in the paper, right? So that opens doors for me.”

The entrepreneur continued: “But at the same time, I don't want to talk about my past, I want to have a platform to share what other people have been through because I think that brings us all together. Because feeling misunderstood is such a universal feeling.”

In March 2023, Uchitel launched her podcast, “Miss Understood,” where she interviews high-profile people who have been caught in scandals similar to hers.

“I chose to do this podcast because it was the right trajectory for me to go. It's been a hard 15 years of figuring out what my purpose is when so many people have an idea or a thought of you and that is not who you feel that you are,” she explained.

“It was very hard for me to target one person at a time. So, I chose to do a bunch of interviews and podcasts to try and get people to see that I was a person before and after. And that was more interesting,” Uchitel noted.

Never miss a story — sign up for the OK! newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what OK! has to offer. It’s gossip too good to wait for!

“And now that I have a platform, I don't have to be interviewed about my past about anything like that,” she added. “There are so many other people that have felt misunderstood or felt that they have been reduced to a single headline or a narrative that has not captured who they are.”

The Daily Mail interviewed Uchitel.