Recently, in the course of dealing with the nuts and bolts of my name change stuff, I hearkened back to my humble beginnings in the great State of Illinois, where I was hatched. I submitted a request to change my name on my birth certificate, and I received a rejection notice indicating that I needed to remit a nominal fee for this service and to fill in an attached form.

I don't have a problem with that, however, the attached form was not an application for change of birth certificate, but for change of death certificate! Was this a mistake, or was someone from the Department of Public Records trying to convey some message?

My contact in the Illinois Gender Alliance is of the opinion that the latter may actually be the case. Apparently, according to my source, DuPage County, which bears the distinction of being my birthplace, is a bastion of staunch conservatism and is distinctly unfriendly to transgender residents, having at one point been most contrary toward an IGA member looking to make similar changes to her property tax records there.

IGA is currently taking up the cause of another Illinois sister recently returned from Thailand and seeking to change the gender marker on her birth certificate. The State of Illinois will not accept certification for this purpose from doctors outside the US. What do they want, photographic evidence?

I intend to gird myself for battle with some low level bureaucrat or other today and will keep y'all posted.

God that is terrible Robyn. I hope the IGA sticks it to whoever the jerk is who sent that notice. You are right about DuPage though as they are not the hot bed of progress. Anyway just wanted to say I hope this all goes well and smooths over.

Q