Emily Lai

Marriage and family therapist

Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT)
Clinical Fellow (AAMFT)
Child-Centered Play Therapy (CCPT)

Emily is a California-licensed and HK-certified Marriage and Family Therapist with a Master’s degree in Marital and Family Therapy from Fuller Theological Seminary (USA). She is also a Clinical Fellow of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT). Emily left her law career in Hong Kong 9 years ago to pursue her passion of helping people understand themselves, experience wholistic healing, and cultivate healthy relationships. She provides therapy to individuals, couples, and families using a trauma-informed and attachment-based perspective.

With a background working in community mental health agencies, Emily has extensive experience working with children, teens and adults on issues including depression, anxiety, trauma, self-esteem, marriage/relationship distress, and grief. She has advanced training in Emotionally-Focused Couples Therapy (EFT), Internal Family Systems (IFS Level 1), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), and Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT), which she draws from in her work with clients. She also provides pre-marital counseling as a certified Prepare/Enrich facilitator.

As an adjunct lecturer, Emily teaches the course “Emotion Regulation” at Lutheran Theological Seminary. She values the unique story of each client while working in a warm, supportive style to help clients uncover relational patterns that are hindering them and build healthy pathways of communication.

Emily conducts sessions in English, Cantonese and Mandarin. She enjoys reading, hiking, and any moment of quiet she can get from her 3 energetic kids.