Conference Anxiety

Last week I confirmed that I will attend a professional conference in October. I’m excited, and somewhat anxious. I have attended professional conferences before. In fact, I attended the national conference for the American Council of Teachers of Foreign Language (ACTFL) for three consecutive years while I was teaching. I gave presentations at two of those. Yet this will be my first professional conference since my transition, and that produces some anxiety in me.

When I booked my hotel room for the conference, I felt concerned. My understanding was that the conference would assign two people per room, and since I was the only one attending from my organization, this worried me rather significantly. I’m used to being around people who accept me as the woman I am, but how would a complete stranger from some other part of the country react when she had to share a hotel room with me? I called a friend who works at the local university to talk with her about it. I knew she was attending as well, so I asked her if she would considering rooming with me. We have interacted many times both professionally and socially, and I felt quite comfortable with the prospect of sharing a room with her. She graciously affirmed that she would willingly do so, were that necessary, but proceeded to correct my misunderstanding of the room situation at the conference. I would not need to share a room with anyone unless I chose to do so. Her explanation relieved my anxiety, as did her affirmation of me as a potential roommate.

My second point of anxiety relates to traveling. This will be my first time to fly since my transition. This issue concerns me less, because all my identification aligns with who I am, so I don’t anticipate any issues other than the usual hassles with the TSA. Still, there is a certain low-level anxiety that comes from being put into close quarters with strangers, and I will be curious to see whether I have any unusual interactions with the TSA agents. If I do, I will be sure to lodge an appropriate complaint.

I shall also be curious to see how interactions go at the conference itself. It will be my first exposure to a group of professionals from around the country. I expect everything will be just fine, but that doesn’t alleviate all my concerns. The other participants will be coming from around the country and may not necessarily come from environments as open and inclusive as my home town. Of course, since one of the key themes of the conference is promoting diversity and inclusion in scholarship programs, one would hope that the practice would begin among ourselves.

I hope that all my concerns will prove to be for naught. But that doesn’t invalidate them. If you are inclined to think that my fears are needless, I would respond that this comes from a position of cis-privilege. Cisgender people don’t have to think about these concerns, though they may have other reasons they feel anxiety, because being cisgender brings the privilege of acceptance in our society. No one questions your gender when you’re cis, so you don’t have to think about being accepted as a man or woman. But when you’re transgender, there is always an underlying question of whether your gender will be validated and affirmed. This is the reality of our lives. I have learned to navigate it fairly well, and my internal anxiety will not show on the outside. But it’s still there.

It helps me to be able to talk about my concerns with trusted cis friends, like my colleague at the university. As a cisgender ally, you can validate the feelings of your transgender friends and support them as they process those fears. You can offer to be there with them in the anxiety-producing situation. You can also work actively to create environments that are fully inclusive and affirming, whether in your workplace, your social settings, your professional interactions, or any other situation. In the end, I must manage my own anxiety, but it helps greatly to know that I am not facing the situation alone.

I look forward to the day when I will not experience these anxieties because the default will be full acceptance. We’re not there yet though.