Wendy Kou has lived in Hong Kong, Canada and the United States, and she speaks and writes fluently in Cantonese, Mandarin, and English. Ms. Kou graduated from the University of Calgary in Canada with a degree in Psychology, and furthered her education with a Master's degree in Marital and Family Therapy with a specialization in the art therapy modality from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.
Ms. Kou's education at Loyola Marymount University has given her a strong foundation to integrate her art backgrounds and to use art processes to provide psychotherapeutic services to clients, including children, adolescents, adults and families. The training fully prepared Ms. Kou to become a practicing marital and family therapist skilled at integrating art processes within a family systems orientation.
Ms. Kou has worked in psychiatric hospitals with adults, in residential group homes with abused and neglected children, and in an out-patient Asian agency with Chinese immigrants to the United States. She has worked extensively with children, adolescents and adults who suffer from mood, anxiety, social and behavioral disorders.
Through her experience, research and dissertation on Art Therapy in parent-child issues with Chinese immigrants, Ms. Kou has come to strongly believe that art therapy is an effective and powerful way to break through defenses toward therapy. Art therapy can be a particularly effective modality to overcome negative attitudes and beliefs toward therapy, because it allows people to express themselves while remaining silent. With children, particularly, art therapy allows the expression of feelings and problems for which children may have no words and which they have never been able to bring forward to others.