I'm a FtM with a question I'd never considered before.
I'll be doing some traveling in the upcoming months, for Thanksgiving and again in February. I dislike travel and it stresses me out so now I have yet another thing to worry about: identification
I've decided that I'm at a place where I feel comfortable moving forward and starting hormones. This probably won't affect my Thanksgiving travel as I'll still be recognizable enough as the girl on my ID. But in February I'm headed out of the country and I'll need to use not only my usual identification but also my passport and I can see that that would be an issue if I've started growing facial hair and/or otherwise don't look like my photo/etc.
Do you have any advice on this? Is there paperwork or something I should bring to facilitate explaining my situation?
I don't think in just a few months you will have too many issues. But, if you want to play it safe you could get a letter from your therapist outlining that you have GID (or what ever term you want to use), and are going through transition. I have one like that in case anyone gives me a hard time using the restroom.
As long as you resemble and present yourself as the person depicted on your ID, you should be fine for domestic travel. Though I only fly 4 or 5 time a year now, I've never had a problem.
Regarding international travel, additional documentation or an explanatory letter may be be helpful if you run into a sticky situation, however if you're only a few months into HRT I really don't think you'll have any issues. When the TSA/customs people look at your ID and then at you, just give em' a goofy smile and they'll usually just snicker and send you on your way.
Travel "security" has come a long way since the years immediately following 9/11. Those were some truly horrible times, especially since I often had to fly 4-5 times a week, sometimes multiple flights a day.
I look exactly like my passport even though it shows M and I transitioned 20+years ago. Never had a problem anywhere in Japan, Thailand or Europe. Now I got my gender in my passport changed and I can't wait to use it. In your case, I think as long as you try to keep yourself look as close to the passport picture as possible like shave your beard or try to be androgenous, it shouldn't be a problem.
That's a relief.
I'll just have to look more like my old self, I guess. I think I'll take a letter with me out of the country though, just in case.
Hi ZombieDog!
I can tell you my story. I have recently travelled overseas to Moscow, then to Munich, and then back home the same route. A lot of inspection places to pass through, as you can imagine. It was a good policy that the embassy (where I applied for a visa) engraved my recent picture right into the visa. Unlike other stories, my current look after being 10 months on HRT has drastically changed me into a female. ...So, in the airports the inspection staff addressed me as "Ma'am" looking at me (and I wore just the regular jeans and a sweatshirt). Then they looked into my passport and the brows of many of them were going up in disbelief! In this case I advised them to look at my most recent picture on the visa page. That really saved me troubles, I guess.
I've had a few problems with airports. Before I went full-time I was consistently gendered as female by airport security staff, even though I was doing my best to look like like my old male ID. I even had the security people try to figure out whether or not to have a man or a woman to do it (and this was after seeing my passport). I was also given a hard time by the passport checker guy at immigration, he was pretty adamant that I didn't look at all like my passport photo.
This was all happened about 8-10 months on hormones.
Thanks, I'm much less worried about it now. I'll just get my ducks in a row and carry on.