Online counselling in English for women in Brussels

If you want an English-speaking counsellor in Brussels, I offer person-centred counselling for women, online by secure video from the UK. You can book directly, with no referral, at £45 a session. I'm a trainee counsellor and BACP student member, working under regular supervision. This is private counselling from the UK, not Belgian healthcare, and I'm not a Belgian psychologist.

Expat life in Brussels: an unusually international city

A large share of the people who live in Brussels come from somewhere else. On 1 January 2025, according to the Brussels statistics institute BISA, the region had 467,055 residents without Belgian nationality, from 183 different nationalities. Of those, 237,731 were women, and 291,627 held the nationality of another EU country. A year later the share was just under 37% of the population, as VRT reported in October 2026.

The European institutions are a big part of this. BISA counted 41,775 people employed by European institutions in the region at the end of 2024, of whom 23,840 were women. Add international institutions, embassies and diplomatic staff, and the total passes 53,000. Those are employees only. Their partners and children aren't in that count, and neither is everyone working in the organisations that grow up around the institutions.

So you are far from alone here. That can make it more confusing when you still feel lonely.

Finding an English-speaking therapist in Brussels

Brussels has something many cities don't: an established English-language mental health charity. Community Help Service (CHS) runs a confidential helpline for English speakers, staffed by volunteers, and a mental health centre with an English-speaking team of psychologists, psychotherapists and psychiatrists. If you want in-person help in English, that's a good place to start. My guide on how to find a therapist abroad lists the questions worth asking any practice before you commit.

Belgium also reimburses some psychological care through its first-line scheme, run via regional mental health networks. According to the national health insurer INAMI, you don't need a prescription. For adults the first individual session is free and later ones carry a small personal share, with up to eight first-line support sessions in a 12-month period. Sessions must be with a clinical psychologist or orthopedagogue affiliated to a network, and video is only foreseen when you can't travel. Whether you'll find one who works in English, and how soon, depends on the network and the practitioner.

Brussels is officially bilingual in French and Dutch, and a lot of your health admin will arrive in one of those, not in English. It's normal to feel worn down by doing every appointment, form and phone call in your second or third language.

On titles: in Belgium, "psychologist" has been a protected title since a law of 8 November 1993, and the Psychologists' Commission keeps a public register you can search. I'm not on it and I don't use that title. I'm a counsellor, trained in the UK.

Women, work and the "Brussels bubble"

Brussels can be a city where everyone around you seems to have a job title that explains them. If you came with your own post, the pressure might be long hours, short contracts and the sense that your life is on hold until the next career step. If you came as a partner, you might be the person whose CV stopped at the move.

A few situations you might recognise:

• You speak French well enough for the bakery but not well enough to be funny, and you miss being funny.
• Your social circle is entirely work colleagues, or entirely other parents, and none of it feels like yours.
• You're raising children in a country your parents have only visited, and you're carrying the guilt of that distance.
• You can't tell if this is tiredness or homesickness, and there isn't anyone to ask.

You don't need to have a name for it. If loneliness is the heart of it, the page on expat loneliness may help, and the short loneliness test is a private way to check in with yourself. If you're the partner who moved, see being an accompanying partner.

How online sessions with me work from Brussels

Brussels runs one hour ahead of the UK all year, because Belgium and the UK change their clocks on the same weekends. An 8am UK session is 9am for you.

We meet by secure video for 50 minutes. You only need a private space and a reliable connection. Some people book from home after the children are asleep, others from a quiet room at work.

My fee is £45 per session, charged in pounds. I keep a limited number of low-cost places for students, trainees and people on a low income. There's a 48-hour cancellation policy, and you can read the details on the fees page. To start, book a session or email hello@michellefernando.com. I reply within 48 hours.

There's no form to fill in about your symptoms beforehand. We begin wherever you are. If this would be your first time, here is what to expect in a first counselling session, and my checked list of free mental health resources for expats and migrants is there if you'd like to read first.

Some people in Brussels use counselling with me alongside local support, for example while waiting to find an English-speaking psychologist through CHS or a mental health network. That's fine. It helps if you tell me what else you're using, so we're both clear about what our sessions are for and what they aren't.

Who I am

I'm Michelle Fernando, a trainee person-centred counsellor and BACP student member, studying for an MSc in Counselling and Psychotherapy at Keele University. I'm a placement counsellor in Shrewsbury, and I work under regular clinical supervision. I previously trained and worked in Sri Lanka, including at FPA Sri Lanka.

In sessions I try to understand your world as you experience it. I won't diagnose you or hand you a plan. Much of my interest is in culture, migration, and the pull between family duty and your own life. More on the about page.

I'm based in the UK and sessions take place online from there. I'm not part of Belgian healthcare, my sessions aren't reimbursed by Belgian mutualities, and I can't diagnose or prescribe. My fee is lower than a qualified counsellor's because I'm still in training.

When to contact local services

If your life is in danger, call 112.

If you're having thoughts of suicide, you can call the CHS helpline in English on +32 2 616 26 26 (CHS also lists 02 648 40 14 for the same 24/7 helpline). In French, the Centre de Prévention du Suicide line 0800 32 123 is free, anonymous and open 24 hours. In Dutch, call 1813. Télé-Accueil on 107 is a free French-language listening line open around the clock. My page of verified mental health and women's support services in Brussels has more local services, including support for women affected by violence, and the national numbers are on mental health helplines in Belgium.

I don't work with psychosis, eating disorders, addiction, specialist trauma treatment, couples or children. For those, CHS or your GP is a better starting point. For the wider Belgian picture, see English-speaking counselling in Belgium.