Sik-Lam Wong

I am interested in working with marginalized folks: the homeless, the drug addicts, the incarcerated, refugees and those traumatized by war and conflict. With my research background, I ended up published a number of papers on my work with marginalized folks and those suffering from mental illness. My specialty is a trauma protocol call the Flash Technique (more info below).

Some of you have expressed interest in my work, so I would like to share with you a little more about what I have been doing lately. I also would like to invite you to join my team, to support some of my latest endeavors.

Flash Technique

In 2017, a new trauma protocol called the Flash Technique was developed by Phil Manfield in Berkeley, California. Being at the right place and the right time, I have become a leading researcher in the new field of the Flash Technique in the US. This has opened doors for me to lecture at a number of universities: Cal State East Bay in the San Francisco Bay Area; Wayne State University in Detroit; University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley (UT-RGV); and Hunan Normal University (湖南师范大学) in Changsha, China. I have been training counseling and social work students to work with folks with PTSD symptoms in the community, helping them to reduce their trauma symptoms.

As a researcher, I have been trying to make the Flash Technique as simple to use as possible. Students can now help clients reduce their PTSD symptoms by reading from a script. Students with UT-RGV and Counselors without Borders Texas (CWBTx) have been using a Spanish version of one of my scripts to work with refugees coming through the Texas-Mexico border. I am also supporting victims of the civil war in Ethiopia, as part of a network of Ethiopian and international trauma therapists.

I have a video on my theory of how the Flash Technique works. You can see the video by clicking on the following link.

ttps://youtu.be/tytpO2yNB-A

What are you doing now?

Working with marginalized and traumatized folks can be challenging but also rewarding.

My interest is not in financial gain, but in helping those who are disadvantaged, those who are impacted by mental health issues. In my private practice, 40% of my clients, those who cannot afford psychotherapy, are seeing me for free. In addition, I have been volunteering at homeless shelters in the Bay Area. In the coming year, I will have an expanded role at a homeless shelter in downtown Oakland, teaching classes to train both residents and the management team to deal with their trauma and anxiety.

I still remember this homeless person in my trauma group, who would stare at the wall the whole time with an expressionless face. Imagine the surprise when, after a few sessions, he could look me in the eye and could join in with the rest of the group. Another unforgettable face belonged to a grieving mother, who for seven years, grieved the death of her son. She had the saddest face I have ever seen. I still remember the surprise and joy when, after a few sessions, she came to my trauma group with a smile on her face and the whole group were so excited to see her smiling for the first time.

I am way past retirement age and I am passing on my knowledge to the next generation of clinicians by training counseling and social work students at a number of universities. I also support a group working with refugees coming through the US southern border and another group working with those traumatized by the civil war in Ethiopia.
My journey as a psychotherapist has been an interesting and exciting one.

I would like invite you to come along so that I can share my joy with you

Financial Needs and A Request For Your Help

I am at a stage where I am limited by funding, especially for our work in Ethiopia. It takes up to US $7k to send a couple of Ethiopian therapists for a week, from Addis Ababa to Tigray, the former conflict zone. Typically, the two therapists can offer group therapy for 200 clients during the week. While the international team can donate their time, the local team must look for funding from nonprofits before they can go to Tigray.

Back in the US, while I typically lecture for free, the professors oftentimes will have to pay, out-of-pocket, for incentives to have clients to complete post-treatment surveys, so that the students can have the data to write their theses. We also have to look for funds for travel to conferences and funds to cover publication charges to publish our papers in academic journals.

Recently, I joined forces with a nonprofit, DeoWorks, that can do all the administrative work for me to raise funds for all these projects. This partnership will also provide a layer of separation between me and my donors.

At this point, I hope to raise $40k for our work through summer 2025. The $40k budget consists of the following:

$28k for up to 4 trips from Addis Ababa to Tigray, for 2 Ethiopian therapists to work with victims of the civil war in Ethiopia
$6k for publication charges for 2 papers
$4k for attendance at 2 conferences
$2k for client incentives for student-led research

If you are interested in supporting my work financially, you can send your contribution by donating here (for US donors).

Support by Donating to Sik-Lam Wong (US donors)

Support by Donating to Sik-Lam Wong (Hong Kong donors)

Background

I grew up in Hong Kong and graduated from St. Joseph’s College in the late 1960s. I had an opportunity to study electrical engineering at Cornell University in upstate New York and later did my PhD in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at UC Berkeley, majoring in plasma physics. I did research for the US government as a contractor for more than 30 years. I made my mark in the community before retiring from the field in 2012.

I like physics. I like to figure out how things work in the physical world. More so, I like psychology. I like to understand how it works in people’s psyche. I ended up getting a counseling degree before my retirement and have practiced since 2016 as a licensed marriage and family therapist in California.

In my second career as a psychotherapist, I am interested in working with marginalized folks, and I invite you to join my journey in ministering to those under-served.

There are too many people in the world who need mental health support. I and some of my colleagues are trying to help out as much as we can. I invite you to be part of our team so that more of the disadvantaged folks can get some help.

— Sik-Lam Wong

Publications

Wong, S. (2018). EMDR-based divorce recovery group: a case study. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 12(2), 58–70. https://dx.doi.org/10.1891/1933-3196.12.2.58

Wong, S. (2019). Flash Technique Group Protocol for highly dissociative clients in a homeless shelter: a clinical report. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 13(1), 20-31. https://doi.org/10.1891/1933-3196.13.1.20

Wong, S. (2021). A model for the flash technique (FT) based on working memory and neuroscience research. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 15(3), 174-184. https://dx.doi.org/10.1891/EMDR-D-21-00048

Wong, S. and Forman-Patel, H. (2022). Doing FT without BLS and without prompted blinking: two vignettes. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 16(2), 2022. 61-67. https://dx.doi.org/10.1891/EMDR-2022-0001

Gustavson, K. and Wong, S. (2023). Research on Low-Intensity Flash Technique trauma intervention by pre-licensed student-clinicians. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 17 (2), 54-69. https://dx.doi.org/10.1891/EMDR-2022-0059

Yan, Y., Ling, H., and Wong, S. (2023). Is exposure necessary? Flash Technique for post-traumatic stress response (in Chinese with English abstract). Advances in Psychological Science 31(8), 1517–1527. https://dx.doi.org/10.3724/SP.J.1042.2023.01517

Ling, H., Liu H., Zhou, W., Yan, Y., Wong, S., and Zhang, J. (2024). Intervention of Flash Technique on anxiety of college students with childhood trauma (in Chinese with English abstract). Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology 32(1), 222-227. https://dx.doi.org/10.16128/j.cnki.1005-3611.2024.01.041

Ling, H., Zhou, Y., Wang, Y., Yan Y., Wong, S., and Zhang, J. (2024). A Case study of Flash Technique improving depression in early trauma survivors (in Chinese with English abstract). Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology. 32(2), 475-479. https://dx.doi.org/10.16128/j.cnki.1005-3611.2024.02.042

Woldemariam, S., Ashman, D., Carvalho, E., Wong, S., and Hoersting, R. (2024). AIP-based Professional Intervention Program for Adversity (PIPA) for trauma and stress reduction in groups: a pilot study in Ethiopia. Frontiers of Psychiatry 15:1351713. https://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2024.1351713

Under Preparation

Using playdough in the AIP-based Professional Intervention Program for Adversity (PIPA): An Observational note from PIPA trauma support sessions for illiterate rural women in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia. (2025). Alemayehu Tibebe and Sik-Lam Wong

Flash Technique as a Low intensity Trauma Intervention for Migrants from Central and South America (2025). Selma Yznaga and Sik-Lam Wong

Sik-Lam is a California licensed marriage and family therapist, #92414 (licensed since April 2016), specializing in EMDR and Flash Technique-based trauma therapy.