Emily is a morning person, meaning she wakes up with lots of energy but towards the end of the day her brain might get foggy, and by 10pm she is definitely ready for bed.  Those close to her know the nasty witch she can be if kept up too late or awoken in the middle of the night.  Beware the sleepy Emily, she bites. 

She is very grateful for a wonderful family. On July 4th, 2004, Emily married her college sweetheart, Gary.  Emily's parents, Maggie and Dave, have always been very supportive and generous, helping her out through school and beyond.  She has a younger Brother, Ari who is a student at UCSD.

Emily has a poor memory.  Probably one reason Emily and Gary get along so well is because she quickly forgets the times he has made her angry.  As a coping strategy to her bad memory, Emily writes a lot of lists and gets organized.  Since she is afraid to forget something important, most tasks get done in advance. If there is anything she is not, it is a procrastinator.

 

Because of her good work habits, Emily was a good student.  She graduated cum laude with a BS in Biology from UC Irvine.  Then she earned her masters in Genetic Counseling with honors from Cal State Northridge.   Emily proud to be the genetic counselor at Kaiser Permenente at the West Los Angeles Medical Center.  She enjoys her career helping patients understand and make decisions about genetic conditions in their families. 

 

Emily is also multilingual.  She began learning French in high school, continuing with some courses in college, and culminating with a education abroad experience for part of her Junior year in France. There she was emersed in another culture, met some amazing people, and learned to make great quiche and mousseline de poire (one of her best dishes).  However, once she got back from France, there weren’t many people around with whom she could converse in French.  Also, she thought it might be nice to be able to communicate directly with the sizeable proportion of her patients who spoke Spanish.  After a few courses while in graduate school, she was able to convince her Spanish-speaking patients that she understood what they were saying.

Outside of work, some of her interests include reading science-fiction/fantasy, camping, playing computer games, and exercising.  In fact, the diversion that Emily spends the most time on is working out.  Once on the swim team in high school, she now also runs and bikes to train as a triathlete.  She has already completed a few half triathlons, and is hoping to complete two olympic distance triathlons this season. In fact, she is the first one to admit that she is hooked on exercise, needs more and more to get the same high, and will go into withdrawal if she can’t work out for more than a couple days.