Introduction

TransFormations was a 2019 biannual conference that is part of a long series of biannual Trans Clinical Conferences organized by the Psychotherapy Center for Gender and Sexuality (PCGS), a division of the Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy. Every two years, PCGS sponsors a clinical conference exploring the psychodynamics of psychotherapeutic theory and practice in the context of trans identities. From the beginning in 2008, the conference has been a gathering of clinicians and researchers who are developing innovative theories and clinical practice approaches to working in psychotherapy and psychoanalysis with trans and nonbinary (TGNB) clients. It has also been a setting for TGNB professionals to lead and discuss this work. The executive committee at that point consisted of co-directors Bob Najjar and Eddie Pabon, founder Joanne Spina, Tobin Berliner, Gary Jacobson, Anna Kramarsky, Jan Niemira, Allana Stark, Gordon Powell, Karalyn Violeta, and myself. Gordon Powell, Allana Stark, Gary Jacobson, D. M. Maynard, Patricia Molloy, and Betty Teng were my editing team who assisted me in preparing the papers for publication. They were generous with their time and expertise. Our sixth biannual conference, on March 29 and 30, 2019, focused on the interplay of clinical practice and theories of development. Presenters explored how clinicians approach psychotherapy and psychoanalysis while engaging with traditional and emerging developmental theories. Our 2019 conference took place at CUNY John Jay College on West 59th Street in Manhattan, in close proximity to PCGS. Our keynote was given by Katherine (Kit) Rachlin, titled “Trust in Uncertainty: The Therapeutic Structure of Possibility.” Kit was a unanimous choice for our keynote, given the breadth of her clinical and advocacy accomplishments. However, her talk was not only a reflection of what she had witnessed but was a vision of the future and a challenge for us to look ahead at what is as yet undiscovered. The Plenary