The idea to share my experience working with immigrant population has been on my mind for a while. As a therapist who is an immigrant myself, I often have clients whose native language is Chinese or whose family of origin is Chinese seeking my assistance because of my ability to speak Mandarin Chinese and my understanding of the Chinese Culture.
My office is located in Andover, near the town line of North Andover and Lawrence. It is also less than 5 miles to the town of Tewksbury and Methuen and about 10 miles to the city of Lowell. Even though the majority of the population in the town of Andover is Non-Hispanic White, the City of Lawrence has a huge population of Hispanics and the City of Lowell has a huge Asian population (Cambodian and Vietnamese and some South Asian population). The town of Methuen and North Andover also has a huge Lebanese population.
So, I have thought about sharing my experiences working with different populations and the commonly seen issues in my office for a while now. This series of article will combine some of the research studies and my own personal experiences with all my clients who have given me the opportunity to work with them.
The other important reason to start writing this series of article is to continue my experiences of my “Going Home 2017” series. In some mysterious ways, I feel a sense of integration of my own identity as a Taiwanese and as an American-Trained therapist after writing that series of the articles. The integration experiences make me want to share with my readers who might be an immigrant or a therapist who work with an immigrant my experiences to help the clients to find a way to integrate their experiences.
Before we started, please know that I am trying my very best to write and to read as much as I can. I am going to try to post the articles in small chunks every week. However, if I don’t, please forgive me and be patient with me.
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