From January 1981 the TSG, the German transsexual law, came into force. This regulates the legal situation for people who profess a different gender identity. Regardless of whether the person concerned has already undergone hormone treatment or even a sex change (cambio de sexo which is the term in Spanish), they can have their names and gender changed accordingly in the birth register.

A first step is to change the first name or adapt it to the new identity. The second step, also referred to as the “big solution”, enables the gender entry in the birth register to be changed. In the official language, this means the “change in gender status under civil status law”.

 Both steps can be applied for in succession or simultaneously.

The requirements for the right to change a male to a female first name or vice versa are as follows:

• The person concerned has had to live in their new gender identity for at least three years
• For those affected, it can be assumed that this gender identity will not change again
• Proof of hormone treatment or gender reassignment surgery is not necessary

These circumstances must be confirmed by two independent reports. However, the process up to the actual change of the first name can take years.

Any first name change that has already been made will also become invalid if the person concerned becomes a father or mother within 300 days of the court order.

The second step, the final change in the civil status in the birth register, was for a long time linked to a proven incapacity to reproduce. An operative sex change was, therefore, unavoidable. However, the quite serious intervention as a prerequisite for the change in civil status violates the right to physical integrity.

There is still a lot of ambiguity, for example, in marriage and divorce law after a change in the gender identity of one of two spouses. However, the dissolution of an existing marriage is no longer necessary to have the first name and gender identity changed in the birth register. Incidentally, since 2013, gender no longer has to be entered in the birth register.