In this short video, I explain why following a partner abroad can quietly empty out your own sense of self, and how we begin to rebuild it by video.
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Trailing spouse psychotherapy, living abroad, helps you when you moved country because of your partner’s work and have since lost track of your own life. We meet one to one by video, in English, in 1-hour sessions with 50 minutes of therapy, at a time that fits your time zone, wherever the posting has taken you.
I help you name what the move cost you, untangle the gratitude and resentment you feel towards your partner, and build a life abroad that has your own shape. This page is one part of my psychotherapy for people living abroad, which in turn belongs to my online psychotherapy. If the move was your own choice, relocation psychotherapy fits more closely.
From wherever the posting has put you, you can book a free 30-minute call, pick a session time, read my client policy or write to me.
Trailing spouse psychotherapy, living abroad is for the partner who followed. Your partner’s career, posting or contract brought you to a new country, and somewhere along the way your own work, friendships and confidence were left behind. You want to understand what has happened to you and find a life abroad that feels like yours again.
Some lives abroad call for a different focus. If one of these lines describes you more accurately, the linked page will suit you better.
You can also send me an email
These reviews describe clients’ experiences of working with me. They come from my wider practice and do not all relate to online sessions. Each person’s experience is their own, and a review does not promise a particular outcome.
“In more than 20 years of sitting with people, I have found that the partner who followed usually blames themselves for a loss that was never only theirs to carry. They tell me they agreed to the move, so they have no right to complain. I disagree. Agreeing to something does not mean you knew what it would cost. Underneath, I often hear one voice asking ‘Do I still count, now that I bring nothing home?’ and another insisting ‘I will sort this out myself, I do not want to be a burden on anyone.’ Some people hold a third voice too: ‘Notice how lost I am, but please do not look too closely.’ Grief that is allowed a name tends to loosen its grip.”
Mark Colclough, MA, psychotherapist and EFT couples therapist
I am Mark Colclough, MA. I have practised since 2004 and offer online psychotherapy and couples therapy in English.
My training brings together your emotions, your thoughts and your relationships. My deep passion is the moment when what happens between you finally makes sense, to each of you and to each other. I have lived and worked in nine countries, so I know something of life across languages, cultures and borders.
Read about my background, or explore online psychotherapy and online couples therapy.
I meet regularly with experienced psychotherapists to reflect on my work, question my understanding and develop my skills. Supervision is part of the professional care I bring to individual and couples work, including online sessions.
My focus is thoughtful practice, integrity and responsibility.
You are welcome to ask about the kind of support you need.
Tell me where you are based and your time zone. We can then consider whether online sessions together are suitable.
Esther is 38 and moved to Singapore 3 years ago when her husband’s bank offered him a regional role. In Amsterdam she ran a small architecture studio. Here her work permit does not allow her to practise, so she manages the household, the helper’s schedule and their daughter’s school forms. Her husband often says how much he appreciates her. She smiles, then lies awake at night feeling invisible, and ashamed of feeling it.
I would begin with the studio, and with what Esther lost when she closed its doors, before we look at the marriage. In a first video session she would probably notice that her shame grows each time she is thanked, because the thanks confirms that her role is now to support.
I have presented this clinical example as a compound of 22 years of clinical practice.
You have tried hard to make a life you did not choose alone work, and the effort has slowly worn you thin.
There is no right time and no perfect reason to begin. A sense that you have gone missing inside your partner’s opportunity is enough. You do not need a diagnosis, a crisis or a neat account of what is wrong before we meet. In 22 years of practice, and from my own life in 9 countries, I have learned to recognise when the strain of following someone has stopped being temporary and has become a pattern that needs attention.
I will help you see what is happening to you, what keeps it going and what needs to change. The 6 questions below can help you decide whether to get in touch.
If so, take it seriously. You run the household, sort the paperwork, research the doctors and organise the weekends, and by evening you are tired without being able to say what you achieved. It is not laziness. Every task serves someone else’s plan.
I look at whether this emptiness belongs to the first months of a move or has settled in for good. That difference tells us how much needs to change. When you are ready, book a session with me and we begin to sort the 2 apart.
Yes, and both feelings can be honest. Gratitude protects the marriage and the decision you made together. Resentment protects the part of you that gave up something real and has not yet been acknowledged.
I do not treat either feeling as the wrong one. In my way of working we listen to each part of you and ask what it is guarding. Once the resentment has a voice in our sessions, it usually needs to shout less at home, and you can decide what to say to your partner directly.
When your partner is your main adult contact, their mood, their late meetings and their trips start to matter enormously. A delayed reply can feel like being forgotten. You may find yourself checking their calendar, rehearsing what you will say, or needing to hear that you still matter in this new life.
Your wish to feel important to them is legitimate, and I will never make you feel needy for it. What I help you change is how much of your safety rests on one person. We look at the fear underneath, often an older fear of being overlooked, and you practise asking for what you need in plain words.
This is common in the following role, and it often confuses both of you. You want them to see how hard this is. Yet when they reach out, a sudden coolness takes over, as if accepting comfort from them would mean admitting you are dependent on them.
I slow this down with you, so we can find the exact moment the longing turns into a wish to retreat. Often it is the feeling of being looked after by the person whose career cost you yours. I have compassion for that protective move, and I will also ask you to take responsibility when it shuts your partner out.
Many trailing partners start out sociable, then quietly pull back. The coffee mornings repeat the same topics, the friendships end with every rotation, and keeping up a cheerful face costs energy you no longer have. Staying home with a screen can feel like the only rest.
My view is that needing distance from a community that does not fit you is reasonable. What I help you see is whether the withdrawal still protects you or now isolates you. We look for contact on your own terms, one or 2 people who see more of you, before the retreat hardens into loneliness.
Years of adapting to a new country, a partner’s schedule and the expectations of a corporate family can blur your outline. You may struggle to say what you enjoy, what you are good at or what you want next. That blurring shows how hard you have been working to make the move succeed, not that something in you is broken.
I help you look at which parts of your old self you miss, which you are glad to have left, and what new parts are trying to appear. I will challenge you when you shrink your own wishes, but I will not decide who you should become. The goal is a clearer sense of what fits you here.
If you recognised yourself here, book a free call to talk it through, or choose a session time if you already know you want to begin.
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Tell me briefly what kind of support you are looking for.
Include your country and time zone so we can discuss whether online work together is possible and find a suitable time.
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Understanding why the move hollowed you out matters, but the work must also change how you spend your days, speak to your partner and plan your future.
Working with me will help you understand what the move has done to your identity, recognise the patterns that keep you stuck in a supporting role, and make changes you can feel within a normal week. Insight alone rarely changes much if you still wake up to the same empty calendar.
Over 22 years of practice I have seen trailing partners move fastest when I stay active in the room. I tell you what I notice, I guide the focus and I push back when an explanation keeps you small. These 6 questions describe what we work towards.
For men: online therapy for men as trailing partners. Related reading: Why do I feel stuck in the life I chose abroad? and Why don’t I feel like myself since moving abroad?.
I help you separate the central loss from everything that has piled up around it. Boredom, irritability and low mood are often results rather than causes. Underneath them may sit the loss of a profession, of financial independence, of a language in which you were witty, or of a family nearby who knew you.
I tell you what I think is happening, what needs attention first and which stories about yourself are holding you back. When you want to start tracing it, book a session with me and we name those losses together.
By learning its early signs. There is usually a sequence: your partner mentions a work dinner, you feel a small drop in your chest, you agree before you have checked your own plans, and later you feel bitter. Catching the drop gives you a moment in which you can answer differently.
In our sessions I help you slow that sequence down and see what triggers it and what it protects. Seeing it is only half the work. We practise a different response, in sessions and between them, until you can use it at your own kitchen table.
Steadying yourself does not mean forcing a smile or pretending life abroad is lovely. It means staying present enough to understand what you feel and choose what to do with it. Some of the sadness is grief for a life that ended when you boarded the plane.
I help you notice the wave sooner and understand what your body is reacting to, perhaps the silence of an afternoon or the arrival of yet another invitation addressed to your partner. I will ask you to practise small, daily ways of settling between sessions.
Clear speaking starts with knowing what you feel, what you need and what is yours to own. Fear of seeming spoiled, or a store of unspoken resentment, can make you either swallow everything or let it out all at once in an argument about something small.
Together we find words that are honest, specific and proportionate, such as asking for a fixed evening that belongs to you or for a real say in the next contract decision. I challenge you when you silence yourself, and also when you expect your partner to guess what you never said.
Decisions become clearer when you separate guilt, loyalty and other people’s expectations from what you actually know and value. Many trailing partners wait for permission that never comes, or swing between staying forever and leaving tomorrow, while the next extension is signed without them.
I help you look at the realistic consequences of each option and what each would ask of you. You get my honest professional view, and I will say when I see you avoiding the choice, but the decision remains yours.
Change has to show up in your actual weeks, not only in how you feel during our sessions. You may need work or study of your own, money that is clearly yours, friendships that do not depend on the next posting, or a different agreement with your partner about whose career comes first.
Together we sort what must change from what can stay as it is. Your adaptability and your loyalty are strengths, and they are not the problem. The aim is a life abroad in which your choices answer to your own values as well as to the family plan.
You can also send me an email
You do not need a diagnosis, a tidy story or the right words. We start with your life as it is now and what you want to change.
When you begin, I listen closely, help you name the main difficulty and give our work a clear direction from the first session. You do not have to explain your whole history first.
For many trailing partners, structured individual work in my online psychotherapy is the right container, because the focus is your own life rather than the marriage. If it becomes clear that the relationship needs both of you, online couples therapy offers long-term relational development and healing. And when you already know the work will take some time, a therapy bundle gives you real savings and a plan agreed at the outset.
I ask what brought you to therapy now, what your days look like, what you have already tried and what you would like to feel differently.
Near the end I offer my first reading of what the move has done to you and propose where we might go. Then you judge whether this way of working suits you. A free 30-minute call is there if you want to meet me before you commit.
Individual work is right when the main question is about you: your identity, your losses, your work, your confidence and your place in the family. We can explore the marriage in depth without your partner joining the call, which often makes it easier to say what you really feel.
Week by week I bring direction, continuity and frank challenge to your own story abroad. If your difficulties abroad reach beyond the trailing role, online psychotherapy describes my structured individual work as a whole.
Joint sessions make more sense once the marriage itself is what needs steady attention. If the same argument about the move returns every week, if trust has been damaged, or if one of you keeps reaching out while the other withdraws, working together usually helps more than working apart.
In couples work I help you both see the cycle between you, own your share of it and find steadier ways of being close. Online couples therapy is long-term relational development and healing, and some partners begin alone with me and move to joint sessions later.
The pace depends on how heavy things feel, how much room your week allows and how much continuity the work needs.
I usually suggest weekly or fortnightly sessions at the start. I will tell you plainly if the gaps are too long to build anything, or when we can safely meet less often. Because we meet by video, our work can continue through home leave and the next posting.
A bundle makes sense when you know the work will take several sessions and you want continuity instead of deciding after each one whether you deserve to continue. A plan agreed in advance ends that private negotiation.
A bundle lowers the cost of each session and gives you the security of a structured plan. The options sit on therapy discounts and bundles, and the cards lower on this page show them too.
Therapy has done its job when you feel more ownership of your life abroad, can speak to your partner clearly and no longer measure your worth by how well you support everyone else.
We look at your progress together and in the open, and I have no interest in keeping you in therapy for its own sake. Sessions can become less frequent, pause or end when the purpose has been reached. Coming back later, perhaps before the next move, does not mean the earlier work failed.
Not sure this is where to start? Here is how trailing spouse psychotherapy compares with the options partners who followed most often consider.
| Option | Choose it when | Pace |
|---|---|---|
| Trailing spouse psychotherapy (this page) | You moved for your partner’s work and have lost your own footing. | Weekly 1-hour video sessions at first |
| Relocation psychotherapy | You chose the move yourself and settling in is the main strain. | A focused course of video sessions |
| Psychotherapy for people living abroad | Life abroad is hard in several ways and you want to look at it whole. | 1-hour video sessions at a pace you choose |
| Couples therapy living abroad | The marriage needs work and your partner is willing to join. | Longer video sessions together |
Trailing spouse psychotherapy is individual psychotherapy by video, in English, for the partner who moved abroad because of the other’s career. It focuses on what the move has done to your identity, work, money, friendships and marriage, and on building a life abroad that is also your own.
I work in depth with the whole person: your feelings, your history, your relationships and what you learned in your family about putting others first. It is part of my psychotherapy for people living abroad.
Come when the role is costing you sleep, confidence, closeness or a sense of direction, or when you no longer recognise yourself. If part of you suspects something important has gone missing, trust that.
I look at how long you have felt this way, whether it is growing, and what you have quietly given up. If it keeps returning however well you organise your days, it deserves proper attention.
Yes, often it can. Therapy cannot hand your old career back, and I do not promise a particular outcome. What it can do is help you grieve what you gave up, understand why it still hurts and work out what kind of work or purpose would fit you now.
In my clinical experience, the loss of a profession is often minimised, both by the person and by the people around them. We give it the weight it deserves, then look at what you want to build next.
No. Wanting a life of your own does not cancel your commitment to the family.
I help you look at the beliefs that make your own needs feel selfish, often learned long before the move. Then we work out which needs you can meet within the current arrangement and which would require a conversation with your partner.
Both are ways of trying to feel safe when your partner has become your main anchor abroad. Some days you need constant contact and reassurance. Other days you go cool and self-sufficient so as not to feel how much you depend on them. Neither is a flaw in your character.
I help you see which way you move under pressure, what each move is trying to achieve and what it costs you both. Then we build steadier options: asking for closeness plainly, and taking space without punishing.
We start with the present. I ask about your daily life abroad, how the move came about, what you miss and what you want to change. By the end you will have my first reading of the situation and a suggested direction.
There is nothing to prepare, and you do not need to have your feelings sorted. Book your first session or start with a free 30-minute call if you would like to meet me first.
Plan for a course of sessions over a few months rather than one or 2 conversations. That is often enough to name the losses, change some patterns and make a first practical change. If the role touches older experiences of being overlooked, the work usually takes longer.
With trailing partners, a defined first stretch that we review frankly tends to achieve far more than open-ended drifting. At each review we decide together whether to carry on, meet less often or stop.
Yes. For trailing partners, video is often the most practical option, because it continues when you move again and keeps your therapist outside the small expat world where everyone knows everyone.
All it takes is a room where nobody can listen in, headphones, decent internet and a laptop or tablet. If your partner or children are home, a parked car or a booked room in a co-working space can work well. The booking calendar shows all times in your own time zone, and we can settle any doubts on a free call.
Individual psychotherapy is booked as 1-hour online sessions, each with 50 minutes of therapy, and that is how trailing spouse work runs too. My prices page lists the current fees in US dollars.
When the work looks set to run for a while, a therapy bundle takes 10 per cent off each session and fixes a plan in advance. Details are on therapy discounts and bundles.
Pick a time on the booking page, or ask for a free 30-minute call if a first conversation feels easier. Slots appear in the time zone of wherever you are living now.
If none of the times suit you, or something has become acute, write to me directly. I hold some room for acute cases, usually a time within days, and acute psychotherapy, living abroad describes that help. Book that first hour, and we start with the life you are living now.
You can also send me an email
I want therapy to help you understand your experience and make choices you can use in everyday life. We pay attention to feelings, needs and the responses that happen before you have time to think.
Our online room should offer enough trust and honesty to explore what is difficult. I bring attention and professional judgement. You bring your experience, questions and the right to say when something does not fit.
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