About 10 days ago, I got an envelope from the Michigan Secretary of State. Inside was my renewed driver’s license with a major change on it. Where it said sex the F gender marker was finally there. I was elated and beaming. Niki asked me why was it so important all it was an F instead of M. I don’t know that I could put in words what all it means but to me it was significant. I guess in thinking it over it is the fact that after over 40 years of having a driver’s license this simple letter was the accumulation of an entire life that had been spent fighting myself. You see I spend over 50 years in a mental struggle trying to resolve the conflict between what my body said and what my mind said. For a number of years I tried to explain it that what was between my legs was my sex, and what was between my ears was my gender. Mine did not match. Now I could look down at my identity and see with my own eyes F. This was huge, 10 years ago it would’ve required me to have some major surgeries done, which I could not afford to get this changed. The change came over a period of time. First under the Obama administration the rules were changed to get the sex on your passport changed. It now required only a physician’s statement that you are far enough along in your transition to be considered having changed your gender. The US Department of State no longer required surgery. To me it was not worth the effort to change my passport because I did not carry my passport everywhere. So although it was something I could do it did not seem worth the effort. Earlier this year, some people sued the Michigan Secretary of State because there was not clear guidelines as to how to change the gender on the drivers license, where the State Department had a clear set of requirements. In order to avoid being sued the Secretary of State issued a regulation that said if the person has a passport with the gender marker changed, then the state of Michigan will also change the gender marker on the drivers license or state issued ID.

Now it was worth my while to go through the process to have my passport reissued with my gender changed so then I could go to the Michigan Secretary of State office and have my drivers license changed. When I went to the post office to change my passport, our local post office had never done this so I became a guinea pig. I had an incredibly helpful clerk at the post office who took the time and gathered all the paperwork required and processed my passport application. When I got my passport at the end of June there was a certain victory dance if you will. But the next biggest hurdle would be the drivers license. I had the day off on 1 July and decided that was the day I would have the time to sit through the process at the Secretary of State office. Wanting to be assured that all of the facts that I had gotten off the Internet, were accurate, I called the Secretary of State’s office in Lansing to verify that I would have all of the correct paperwork to change the gender on my drivers license. When I called the person I talked to told me I needed to have my birth certificate changed and that would require a doctor’s letter stating that I had had the proper surgeries for gender reassignment. I question this person and said that I had heard that was no longer the case. She then very kindly looked it up and found out what I had read was that all I needed was my passport changed. She let me know that it was on page 3 of the recent changes. I asked if the local office would also know about these changes. Her reply was just tell them it’s on page 3. When I went to the Secretary of State’s office and stood in line to get the proper paperwork and my queuing number the person behind the counter told me I needed my changed birth certificate. Another Secretary of State person overheard that and said no as long as I had a current passport we could do it. When I got to the actual clerk was going to renew my drivers license (three months early by the way) she questioned it but then was told by the same clerk that all I needed was the current passport. Everyone in the process was gracious and kind and very helpful, but had I not done my own research or not stood up my drivers license might still have an M. The next step which I look forward to is getting my name changed on my military DD 214 so I can then present that and get the veteran marker added to my drivers license. But for now getting the F is enough for me.