About me

I am the daughter of Chinese immigrants who came to the U.S. following the Cultural Revolution, seeking education and stability. Growing up in Texas with few people who shared my cultural background, I learned firsthand the challenges of feeling like an outsider. My family's immigration experience led to disrupted attachments, where disconnecting from emotions and avoiding connections were survival strategies, though they came at the cost of emotional well-being.

As a teenager, I was drawn to avant-garde art, literature, and philosophy because I questioned the rules that seemed arbitrary. Despite this, I followed my immigrant parents' dreams and pursued a practical path in business and engineering. I worked my way through college, moved to San Francisco, and worked in marketing and product management for early stage tech startups. However, following the conventional path led me to an existential crisis where I questioned my direction.

Through meditation and personal therapy, I began to explore emotions and embodiment more deeply. I engaged with radical politics and racial justice movements, which challenged me to confront my own privileges and experiences of oppression. I became interested in how societal power structures define what is considered normal and valuable and how these systems affect our relationships with ourselves and others. Over time, I discovered that fulfillment comes not from avoidance, but from embracing human connection.

The way I listen to you is shaped by my experiences as a queer woman of color, a child of immigrants, and someone navigating multiple cultures. In addition to being a therapist, I am also an artist, activist, parent, and lifelong learner.

Pausing for self-reflection is an ethical practice that helps us reduce harm to ourselves, other people, and our planet.

Beyond self-care and the ability to (really) listen, the practice of doing nothing has something broader to offer us: an antidote to the rhetoric of growth. In the context of health and ecology, things that grow unchecked are often considered parasitic or cancerous. Yet we inhabit a culture that privileges novelty and growth over the cyclical and regenerative. ​Our very idea of productivity is premised on the idea of producing something new, whereas we do not tend to see maintenance and care as productive in the same way.”

- JENNY ODELL

Education and Training

My work is informed by psychoanalysis, neurobiology, critical theory, family systems, and trauma-centered modalities. I engage in ongoing consultation, training, teaching, advocacy, and my own personal psychotherapy.

License 
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist #133654.

Education
​I hold an MA in Counseling Psychology from California Institute of Integral Studies with a concentration in Community Mental Health, which had an emphasis on social justice, systems thinking, and liberation psychology. 

​Clinical Work Experience
I started a private practice in San Francisco in 2023. Previously, I worked with adults, families, and children at The Marina Counseling Center, Homeless Children's Network, ​The Clinic Without Walls, and Seeds of Awareness. I also worked as an Early Childhood Mental Health Consultant at preschools and a domestic violence shelter in SF. 
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Current Affiliations

• Board Member, ​Community Forward SF, a supportive housing and mental health services organization in San Francisco
• DEI Steering Committee, Learning & Reconciliation Committee, San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis

Publications

• Lin-Arlow, J. (2021) For Those Who Remain: Gentrification, Cultural Displacement, and Sense of Home. Fort Da 27:29-40, winner of the annual writing award from the Northern California Society of Psychoanalytic Psychology (NCSPP)

General Training​​

• Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Training Program with San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis (2023 - 2026)
• EMDR (2023 - 2024)
• NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM) Informed Professional (2021)
• Early Career Case Conference with Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California (2020 - 2021)
• Foundations of Psychodynamic Clinical Work in Community Mental Health with Coalition for Clinical Social Work (2021)
• Rape Crisis Counseling with Bay Area Women Against Rape (2017)
• Domestic Violence Counseling with Asian Women’s Shelter (2017)

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Couples and Family Training

• The Developmental Model of Couples Therapy (2025-2026)
• Treating Couples, Surmounting Challenges with Harvard Medical School (2024)
• Post-Graduate Training in Couples and Family Therapy with Ackerman Institute for the Family (2021 - 2023)
• Child-Parent Psychotherapy informed practice with UCSF Child Trauma Research Program (2021)
• Early Childhood Mental Heath Consultation Initiative Training with Instituto Familiar De La Raza (2020 - 2021)