In this short video, I explain how my own years in other countries shape the way I work with you by video, and why distress abroad is never only about culture.
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Psychotherapy for people living abroad helps you when life in another country has become harder than you expected: loneliness, lost confidence, strain in your relationships, or a sense that you no longer know who you are. We meet one to one by video, in English, in 1-hour sessions with 50 minutes of therapy, at a time that suits your time zone, and the work can follow you if you move again.
I was born in London, moved to Denmark at 12 and have lived and worked in nine countries. I help you separate what is personal, what is cultural and what needs to change. This is the living-abroad branch of my online psychotherapy. More focused help exists for a crisis abroad, partners who followed a career move, an upcoming move, going home, growing up between cultures and emotion-focused work abroad.
You can arrange a free 30-minute call, find a session time, read the client policy or get in touch.
Psychotherapy for people living abroad is for English-speaking adults who have built, or are trying to build, a life in a country that is not where they grew up. Something about that life has become heavy, and you want to understand it with a therapist who knows from the inside what moving countries does to a person.
Life abroad brings many kinds of strain, and some have their own page. Where a line below sounds more like your life abroad, follow its link to the page written for it.
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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.
“Across the 9 countries I have lived and worked in, I learned that moving abroad does not create your difficulties so much as remove the scaffolding that held them up. At home, family, old friends and a language you never had to think about carried more of you than you realised. Without them, something older comes to the surface. One part of you wonders ‘Does anyone here even notice whether I am all right?’, and another insists ‘I chose this, so I will manage it alone.’ My firm view is that people abroad wait far too long, telling themselves it is only adjustment. Often it is adjustment and something older, and both deserve proper attention.”
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.
Lars is 47, grew up near Aarhus and has lived in Singapore for 9 years with his wife and 2 teenage children. He runs a regional sales team and is well liked. Since his father’s illness began last spring, he has felt numb at work and irritable at home, and he drinks a little more in the evenings. Flying back every few weeks is exhausting. He thinks he should simply be grateful for the life he has.
I would start with the pull between the two countries, because Lars is living in both and resting in neither. In a first video session he would probably notice how alone he feels as the son abroad, and that the irritability at home is grief with nowhere to go.
I have presented this clinical example as a compound of 22 years of clinical practice.
You have tried to adapt, keep busy and stay positive, and life abroad still feels heavier than it should.
There is no right moment and no qualifying reason to start therapy abroad. A feeling that you are not yourself, that your days have gone flat or that your relationships are under strain is enough. You do not need a diagnosis or a crisis first. In 22 years of practice, with my own life spread across countries, I have learned to recognise when ordinary adjustment has turned into something that needs attention.
I will help you see what is happening, what keeps it going and what needs to change, in your personal history and in your life abroad. These 6 questions may help you decide whether it is time to reach out.
If so, notice how much you are holding. At home, a sister, an old friend or a familiar café helped you recover after a hard week. Abroad, the same problems arrive without that net, and small setbacks feel bigger. You may get through each week and feel empty by the weekend.
I would look at what support you have lost, what you have rebuilt and what is missing. That helps us see whether this is a hard stretch or a pattern that keeps you isolated. If that sounds like you, book a session with me and we can look at it together.
Both pulls make sense, because each protects something. One part wants to fit in, learn the language and stop feeling foreign. Another part is afraid of losing who you were, your humour, your habits, your loyalties. You may swing between throwing yourself into local life and retreating into your own world.
I do not ask you to pick a side. I help you see what each part protects, so you can make deliberate choices about what to adopt and what to keep. Belonging abroad rarely means becoming someone else.
When your social world is small, each relationship carries more weight. A friend who cancels, a parent who forgets to call back, a colleague who seems cool: each can feel like proof that you do not matter here. You check your phone, reread messages and wait for a sign.
Wanting to be missed and thought of across borders is a fair wish, and I treat it as one. I help you notice the older fear under the alarm, often a fear of being forgotten, and tell practical distance from emotional rejection. Then we look at asking for contact directly rather than waiting and worrying.
Speaking another language all day, decoding unwritten rules and explaining yourself again and again is tiring. You may start saying no to invitations because contact feels like more work. At first it feels like rest. After a while it feels like isolation.
My view is that your need for rest and privacy is real, and I will not push you into socialising you do not want. I help you understand what the withdrawal protects and rebuild contact at a pace you can manage, so being alone stays a choice and not your only safe place.
In your own language and culture, you knew how to be clever, warm and quick. Here, the jokes do not land, the nuance is lost and you hesitate before speaking. Professional standing may have dropped too. You may start to believe you really are less capable.
I help you separate language and context from your worth. Some confidence returns with practice and support. Some needs a more realistic set of expectations for life in another culture. We look at both, without pretending the loss is not real.
Many people abroad feel too foreign where they live and strangely changed when they visit home. Values, habits and loyalties shift, and you may no longer be sure which version of yourself is real. That uncertainty shows how much you have adapted, not that something is wrong with you.
I help you explore this without forcing a false choice. I will challenge you when I see you shrinking to fit in, and also when you cling to an old self out of fear. The aim is a life abroad in which you still recognise yourself.
If this sounds familiar, request a free call to see whether I am the right fit, or book a session time that works where you live.
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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.
You do not need to explain your whole story in your first message.
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Understanding why life abroad became hard matters, but the work also has to change how you live, connect and decide there.
Working with me will help you see the personal, relational and cultural pressures behind your difficulty, and turn that understanding into concrete changes in boundaries, routines and relationships. Insight about culture is not enough on its own.
In 22 years of practice I have learned to be active in this work. I listen carefully, question assumptions, including your own about the new country, and help you tell what needs adapting from what you should no longer accept. The 6 questions below show what we work towards.
For men: online therapy for expat men. Related reading: Why do I still not feel at home abroad?, Why do I still miss home when I love my life here? and Why do I feel stuck in the life I chose abroad?.
The visible problem may be work, a relationship or loneliness. Underneath there is often a deeper loss: of identity, of belonging, or of a life that used to make sense. I help you separate these layers so we can see what is most urgent and what keeps it going.
I will not reduce everything to culture, and I will not ignore the international context either. I tell you what I see and challenge explanations that keep you stuck. Whenever your time zone allows, book a session with me and we can start untangling it.
You can learn to notice the difference. Culture shock tends to arrive with the move and ease with time. Older patterns, such as anxiety, grief or a fear of rejection, often existed before and simply got louder abroad. Noticing which is which gives you a choice about how to respond.
I help you look at timing, triggers and meaning, so we respond to the right thing. Then we practise different responses in real situations, between sessions, until they hold up in ordinary life.
Steadying yourself does not mean pretending you are fine or pushing the longing away. It means staying present enough to feel what is there and still decide what to do with your evening, your call home or your next day.
I help you notice the early signs of overload and what they are reacting to, often a loss your body has not caught up with. We find simple ways to settle, and I will ask you to practise them between sessions so they are there when you need them.
Life abroad often comes with pressure to prove the move was worth it, to stay available to family across time zones and to accept unfair conditions at work because your options feel limited. Saying no can feel risky when your network is small.
I help you work out which demands are unsustainable and how to say so clearly. I will challenge both silent over-adapting and anger that comes out sideways. We often practise a real conversation, such as a call with a parent who wants you home.
Clear decisions become possible when you separate loneliness, guilt and fear of failure from what you actually know and want. Staying and leaving can both feel like failing, which is why many people stay stuck for years.
I help you look honestly at each option and what it would require. You get my view, and I will name avoidance, but the choice remains yours. If going home is already on the table, online repatriation psychotherapy focuses on that move.
It goes beyond surviving the new country. You may need different friendships, a new kind of work, a community that shares something of your background, or firmer limits with people at home.
Together we choose which parts of your expat life to reshape and which to protect. Your accent, your homesickness and your mixed loyalties are not problems to remove. The aim is a life abroad that you recognise as your own.
You can also send me an email
You do not need a diagnosis or a tidy story about your move. We start with how life feels now and what you want to change.
When you begin, I listen closely, help you name the central difficulty and give the work a clear direction. You do not need to explain your whole history before we can start.
This is a main branch of my online psychotherapy, structured individual work that suits a life on the move. If the strain lives mainly in your relationship and your partner will join, couples therapy for people living abroad or online couples therapy offer long-term relational development and healing. If you already know the work will take time, a therapy bundle gives you savings and the steadiness of a plan.
I ask what brings you now, how long you have lived where you are, what is hardest about it, what you have tried and what you hope will change. Your full story can unfold later.
By the end, I give you my first understanding and suggest a direction. You decide whether my approach suits you. Some people abroad like to hear my voice before booking, and a free 30-minute call is there for exactly that.
Individual work fits when the focus is your own experience: your loneliness, identity, confidence, choices or history, and how these play out in your life abroad. Your partner, your parents back home and your colleagues abroad can all be explored in depth while you remain the only one on screen.
I offer direction, continuity and honest challenge across sessions, even if you move country in the middle of the work. Online psychotherapy describes my structured individual work in general.
Couples therapy fits better when the relationship itself needs attention: one of you thrives abroad while the other struggles, the same fight about going home keeps returning, or trust has broken under the strain.
In couples work I help you both see the cycle between you and find safer ways to meet it. Couples therapy for people living abroad is long-term relational development and healing for couples in this situation.
The right pace depends on how heavy things feel, how much room your life has and how much you travel. Many people abroad have irregular weeks, so we plan with that in mind.
I usually suggest weekly or fortnightly sessions at first, and I will tell you if the gaps get too long. If travel makes that impossible, back-to-back psychotherapy, living abroad lets us work in concentrated blocks instead.
A bundle makes sense when you know you will need several sessions and want continuity, rather than deciding each time whether to continue. Life abroad is full of decisions already.
A bundle reduces the cost per session and protects time for the work. Details sit on therapy discounts and bundles, and the cards lower on this page show them at a glance.
Therapy has done its job when you feel more ownership and choice in your life abroad, and the original difficulty has eased enough for you to carry on without the same support.
We look at your progress together in the open, and I will not keep you in sessions out of habit. Sessions may thin out, pause or end. If a new move or a new chapter brings you back later, that is not a failure.
Not sure this is the right place to begin? The table puts this page next to 3 neighbouring kinds of help that people in other countries often weigh up.
| Option | Choose it when | Pace |
|---|---|---|
| Psychotherapy for people living abroad (this page) | Life in another country has become heavy, and you want to understand why. | Weekly 1-hour video sessions at first |
| Online psychotherapy | Living abroad is not central, and you want broad individual work. | 1-hour video sessions at a pace you choose |
| Relocation psychotherapy, moving abroad | You are about to move or have only just arrived. | A focused course around the move |
| Online third culture psychotherapy | You grew up across countries and still wonder where you belong. | Weekly 1-hour video sessions |
Psychotherapy for people living abroad is individual therapy by video, in English, for adults whose life in another country has become difficult: lonely, disorienting or straining their sense of self. It helps you understand what is personal, what is cultural and what needs to change.
I bring my own experience of living and working in nine countries, together with 22 years of practice. Within my online psychotherapy it forms the main branch for international lives.
Come when life abroad is costing you sleep, confidence, relationships or joy, or when you keep telling yourself it is only adjustment and it does not pass. If you sense your life abroad has tilted the wrong way, trust that sense.
I look at how long things have felt this way, what changed with the move and what was there before. If the strain is growing rather than easing after the first year, it deserves proper attention.
Yes. Many people abroad live for years with this question unanswered. I cannot make the decision for you, but I can help you see what is really driving it and what each option would ask of you.
In my clinical experience, the stay-or-go question often hides another one, about belonging, a relationship or an old family loyalty. I would start there, so the decision rests on what you truly want.
It is very common, and it is not a sign that you have failed. Loneliness abroad often grows quietly, as early friendships fade and the effort of starting again feels too much.
I help you understand what kind of connection you are missing and what stands in the way of finding it. Sometimes the obstacle is practical. Sometimes it is an older fear of being too much, or not enough, that the move has made louder.
Both are ways of coping with the loss of familiar connection. Some people spend hours on calls home and struggle to invest locally. Others shut the door on home and throw themselves into the new life. Many swing between the two.
I help you see which way you lean, what it protects you from and what it costs. Then we look for a steadier balance: staying connected to home without living there in your head, and building local ties without erasing your past.
We start with where you are now: your country, your daily life and what feels heaviest. I ask about the move, the support you have and what you hope will change. Before we say goodbye on screen, I tell you how I read your situation abroad and which path I would suggest.
You do not need to prepare anything. Book a session at a time that suits your time zone, or start with a free 30-minute call.
Expect to work together across a few months, adjusted to your travel and the seasons of expat life. That is often enough to understand what is happening and make some real changes. If older patterns are involved, or a big decision is on the table, the work may take longer.
In 22 years of practice I have seen that a clear first stretch, reviewed openly, works far better than drifting. We decide together at each review whether to continue, slow down or stop.
For most people abroad, video is the more practical choice, and often the better one. You can keep the same therapist through a move, meet in your own language from your own home, and work with someone outside your small expat circle. Practically, find a room where flatmates, family or a nanny cannot overhear, wear headphones and check your connection.
If you would like to meet in person, fly-in psychotherapy in Copenhagen and weekend psychotherapy in Copenhagen are options. We can discuss what fits on a free call.
Individual psychotherapy is booked as 1-hour online sessions. The fees, in US dollars so they are easy to compare from any country, are listed on my prices page.
When you know the work will take some time, a therapy bundle saves you 10 per cent and gives you a set plan. The options are on therapy discounts and bundles.
Book a first session in the calendar, which shows times in your local time zone, or request a free 30-minute call if you would like to talk first.
If no time fits your time zone, or something has just happened, write to me directly. I hold some room for acute cases, usually a time within days, and acute psychotherapy, living abroad explains that help. Pick a time, and we will begin from where you live 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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P.S. I’ll call you in a bit!
