A space to talk things through — for students navigating life and study far from home
Support for International Students
Studying abroad sounds exciting — and often is. But somewhere between the new city, the new academic system, the new language, and the friends you haven’t made yet, it can also feel surprisingly lonely. Maybe lectures are harder to follow than you expected. Maybe everyone else seems to have found their group already. Maybe you’re homesick in a way you didn’t think you would be, or you’re putting pressure on yourself to make the most of “the best years of your life” when most days just feel like getting through.
All of this is normal — and none of it means you’re failing at being a student abroad. It just means you’re human, in a situation that’s genuinely harder than people often admit.
Since 2009, we’ve worked with international students from universities across the Netherlands, offering a confidential space to talk about whatever’s going on — academic stress, homesickness, culture shock, relationships, identity, or simply the feeling of not quite knowing who you are in this new place yet.
What therapy looks like for students
Sessions are tailored to you — there’s no fixed script. Depending on what’s going on, we might draw on cognitive behavioural therapy, mindfulness-based approaches, or simply structured conversation that helps you make sense of things. Some students come with a specific issue (an anxiety spiral before exams, a relationship that’s fallen apart, a falling-out with flatmates); others come because something feels generally “off” and they’re not sure why.
Either way, the goal is the same: a space where you can be honest, be heard, and start building tools that help — not just for this semester, but for however long you’re navigating life between two (or more) places.
Common things students bring to us
Academic pressure and the fear of falling behind, homesickness that comes in waves — often worse than expected, around holidays especially, difficulty making friends or feeling like you’re always on the outside of a group, relationship issues, whether long-distance or new ones formed abroad, anxiety, low mood, or burnout that’s crept up gradually, and the strange identity question of “who am I here, versus who I was at home.”
The “two lives” feeling
Many international students describe a strange sense of living two lives at once — the life you have here, with its own routines, people, and rhythms, and the life “back home” that continues without you, visible mostly through video calls and social media. Switching between the two can be disorienting: you might feel like a slightly different version of yourself in each place, or struggle to fully relax into either one.
This isn’t something you grow out of automatically — but it is something you can get better at navigating, often just by having the chance to talk it through with someone who isn’t inside either of those worlds. If English isn’t your first language, that’s not a barrier — many of our sessions take place in English specifically because it’s the shared language for students from all over the world. Several of us have also been international students ourselves, in more than one country, so we understand this particular kind of in-between from the inside as well as professionally.
You don’t need a crisis to reach out
A lot of students wait until things feel really bad before considering therapy — but you don’t need to be in crisis to benefit from talking to someone. Sometimes the most useful conversations happen when something feels slightly wrong, before it becomes a bigger problem. If you’re an international student finding it harder than you expected to adjust, you’re not alone — and we’re here to help.
Getting started
We offer sessions in English, in person at our locations in The Hague, Leiden, and Amsterdam, or online — which many students find easier to fit around lectures, part-time work, and everything else. Reach out whenever you’re ready; there’s no waiting list.
International insurance & student insurance
Many of our clients — students and professionals alike — are covered by international insurance plans that include reimbursement for psychological support, including student health insurance policies and broader international/expat insurance plans. If you’re unsure whether your policy covers therapy sessions, it’s worth checking directly with your insurer. We’re happy to provide the documentation you need — invoices and session confirmations — to support a reimbursement claim.
