Your birth certificate must be changed with the US state in which you were born, not where you currently live.
For information on legal name change, please see US Name Changes.
If your state/province will issue an amended birth certificate, that means that there will be a note on the birth certificate saying that it was amended; it may or may not say what specifically has been changed. If your state/province issues a new birth certificate, that means that your original birth certificate will be sealed where no one can access it – although that copy still exists on paper; it’s not completely destroyed, just made inaccessible – and a new one will be printed for you with just your new name and sex designation.
The National Center for Transgender Equality keeps up-to-date information on changing the sex on all your various documents for all 50 US states, the District of Columbia, and the five main US territories (American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands).
If you are a US Citizen but were born outside the United States
You can change your name and gender on your US Department of State issued birth certificates. Proof of surgery is no longer a requirement; the requirements are the same as for obtaining a US Passport. You just need to present a certification from an attending medical physician that the applicant has undergone appropriate clinical treatment for gender transition. There are guidelines explaining exactly what information must be included. See https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/passports/apply-renew-passport/change-of-sex-marker.html for more information.
You must obtain a legal name change (original or certified copy) from the court of the county for which you reside, the original birth certificate, and the appropriate letter from an attending medical physician, and send it all to:
US Dept. of State
1111 19th St. NW, Suite 510
Washington, DC 20502-1705
(202)-955-0307
The State Department will then re-issue a new birth certificate (not amended) and the process takes approximately 6-8 weeks. As of 1999, the fee was $40, but you should call them to obtain the current fee for this process.
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