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Conferences stress me out. They take weeks to prepare for and longer it seems to recover from. Forget the politics that are shoved down your throat, there is the peripheral stuff that no one talks about.

Packing isn’t easy when you are neurotic. As someone who has extraordinarily good organizational skills (euphemism for obsessive compulsive), my detailed list, typed of course, has my outfits broken out by days, inserted into neat little tables. But beyond packing enough cigarettes to support my habit as well as that extra pack I need for the conference-goers who will inevitably bum off of me, there is the issue of what to wear.

My clothes quandary is not simply “chick stuff.” But suit or skirt? Huge question because my choice can have serious repercussions. I’ll never forget the allegations of co-optation that were hurled at me after donning a really slick lavender suit at a recipient conference one year. It was my first suit. And I thought it was neat. It offset my lip and nose rings nicely. That night I sat up in my hotel room, my suit nicely laid out on the bed beside me and wondered when “professional” became a dirty word. I waited a year before buying another suit.

The short answer to the suit question is I will don one if I am presenting to providers on mental patient stuff. If I am talking about my own experiences with restraints and self-injury, I think my words are more palatable to my audience if I look like one of them. If I’m presenting on benefits, a suit isn’t all that necessary. Frankly, the clinicians don’t seem to notice either way, they are usually too focused on my words once they get over their initial fixation on the metal in my face.

Flying to these gigs adds another layer of complexity to the whole conference shebang. There is all that post 9/11 security stuff we are subjected to. And while it’s not like I am trafficking kilos of cocaine across the boarder, the fact that I am a walking pharmacy makes me feel a bit conspicuous. Airports are incredible and a bit overwhelming for many people I’m sure. But for people like me for whom food issues are legion, it is something to behold. With all the food choices offered at any time of the day you can binge without reproach. Where else does an order of a Big Mac at 7:00 in the morning not raise an eyebrow?

I usually go into the whole conference thing by restricting my intake of food. I counter the fatty, high caloric offerings by just saying no, initially. I can usually last until dinner. Then I commence with my fatty food fest.

Nights are long and boring at these conferences. Even if I make it through dinner without stuffing my face I am bound to find myself feeding my loose change into the snack machine at some point. No one knows about my late night visits except the hotel maid who probably shakes her head as she dumps the mountain of wrappers from my garbage in the morning.

I’m a pretty friendly person in normal social settings. Conferences are not normal. You don’t socialize, you schmooze. I find myself talking with people whom I really would rather ignore, and who quite frankly probably feel the same of me, but we do this conference shtick because it’s what’s expected of us. It is politically correct. Political correctness: it may stick in my craw, but it pays the bills.