About Liia
Hi, I’m Liia. I am a psychologist, and researcher with a PhD in Clinical Psychology. I was born and raised in Finland, but have since lived in Australia, the UK, and the Netherlands. I also completed my university studies here in the Netherlands, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Psychology in 2016, and a master’s in Clinical and Health Psychology in 2019. In 2025, I obtained my PhD from Leiden University, specializing in suicide risk detection and prevention.
I work with youth, adults, and couples, and provide therapy in English and Finnish. I believe that every individual and their personal circumstances are different – therefore I also think that every therapy approach should be tailored to the individual, and should be based on ongoing collaboration with the therapist and the client. In my work, I use techniques from a number of evidence-based interventions, including cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), and others. Regardless of the specific techniques used, the most important thing for me will always be to foster a safe, open and accepting atmosphere where we can work together to address whatever is on your mind. As a 10+ year expat myself, I am also familiar with many of the struggles that internationals may face while living abroad, and hope to turn these insights into action steps within my work at Expat Psychologists.
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)
Cognitive behavioral therapy is the first-line treatment for most common mental health complaints, including depression and anxiety. Through CBT, you can gain more understanding into the unhelpful behavioural and thinking patterns that may be undermining your wellbeing, and work to challenge and replace these with healthier patterns. CBT is structured and goal-oriented, helping you identify how thoughts, feelings and behaviours influence one another so that unhelpful patterns become easier to recognise and change. CBT is a collaborative process, and combines talk therapy with practical exercises that help you apply the skills learned in session directly to your everyday life. A special case of CBT, Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), is used to target symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD) and different phobias (including social phobia). ERP is key in helping you take control of your symptoms, rather than letting your symptoms control you.
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Out of your vulnerabilities will come your strength.
– Sigmund Freud
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
EMDR is a structured, evidence-based approach originally developed for treating trauma and PTSD. It helps the brain process difficult memories that may feel “stuck,” so that they become less emotionally charged and less disruptive in daily life. This processing is done by briefly recalling the distressing memory while engaging in bilateral stimulation (BLS), typically through guided rapid eye movements. Research indicates that this dual-attention process can reduce the vividness and emotional intensity of the memory by taxing working memory and facilitating new associations with more adaptive information. The goal is not to erase the memory, but to help it become less activating and more integrated, so that it no longer triggers the same level of distress in daily life.
Although EMDR is best known for trauma, research increasingly shows that it can also be helpful for depression, anxiety, grief, shame, chronic self-criticism, and relationship patterns that feel hard to shift. In these situations, EMDR does not only target single traumatic events but also the underlying memories, beliefs, or patterns that continue to fuel current symptoms. For example, EMDR can help reduce the emotional weight of experiences that contributed to self-criticism, chronic worry, or a persistent sense of not being good enough. By processing these experiences more fully, clients can gain greater emotional stability, and situations that once felt overwhelming become more manageable.
The approach I use is further informed by somatic and attachment-focused EMDR principles, which means we pay careful attention to nervous-system regulation and attachment patterns. This foundation helps ensure that processing is done at a pace that feels manageable, supportive, and grounded in a strong therapeutic relationship.
