English-Speaking Therapists in Lisbon | Individual & Couples Therapy

Sylwia Latacz — Psychologist & EFT Couples Therapist in Lisbon

For me, psychotherapy is not only a method of coping with difficulties — above all it is a method of experiencing one's life more deeply.

My name is Sylwia Latacz and I am a licensed psychologist and psychotherapist.

I earned my master's degree in psychology at Jagiellonian University in Poland, completed a clinical psychiatric internship at the Babiński Hospital in Kraków, and then continued my education as an integrative psychotherapist. In total, I completed 12 years of professional training. Since 2021 I work with individual clients and couples in Lisbon.

I support people in overcoming difficulties, finding a sense of authenticity and solutions in seemingly hopeless situations. I work primarily with expats who are looking for a therapist who knows the specifics of the experience of living abroad.

Psychotherapy can be a path to deeper acceptance of oneself and others. I invite you to take this journey together.

My approach in therapy is a result of many years of learning about different therapy modalities. I've come to understand that there is no one approach superior to all others. What is truly effective is to understand what the client needs in a given moment. Integrative Psychotherapy allows for a better adaptation of the work to the distinctive characteristics and needs of each client, enabling both therapist and client to utilize the best tools based on the type of problem, personality, and stage of therapy.

• Psychodynamic understanding of psychological problems — a deep focus on the roots of current difficulties by exploring early life experiences, relational patterns, and unconscious conflicts. This helps us understand why certain patterns were developed.
• Experiential Therapies (such as Emotion-Focused Therapy) — a deep focus on actively working through emotions, including for couples navigating distance or relocation. For a profound and lasting change to happen, we need to go beyond intellectual insight and engage with feelings on a felt level, allowing for emotional release and reorganization.
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT, Schema Therapy) — practicality and structure in the process. CBT helps to identify, challenge, and modify unhelpful thought patterns and maladaptive behaviors that maintain emotional distress.

Beatriz Carvalho — Clinical Psychologist

My lived experience brings together personal, professional, and community experience that calls for an understanding of subjectivity as inseparable from the material conditions of existence, relations of power, and the historical contexts in which it is situated.

My name is Beatriz Carvalho and I am a clinical psychologist, with a master's degree in clinical psychology (2018) and a postgraduate qualification in psychoanalytic psychotherapy and psychoanalysis (2025).

I began working in psychology in 2016, during my curricular internship at the Centro de Etnopsicologia Clínica at ISPA, where I first encountered clinical work with populations from post-colonial contexts — an area that has remained a constant throughout my practice and has driven several clinical projects.

For the past ten years, I have engaged in regular individual supervision within a psychoanalytic framework, alongside multidisciplinary group supervision with a more ethnopsychological focus. During this time, I have also developed psychoanalytically informed research in collaboration with public health and education institutions, and worked clinically with children, adolescents, and adults — both in private practice and in social and clinical support settings.

• Psychoanalytically Informed Therapy — understanding psychological experience within its relational, cultural, and historical contexts.
• Psychotherapy with Children and Adolescents — considering emotional and subjective experience alongside relationships with parents and caregivers, family dynamics, school and peers, and wider social and cultural environments. Depending on age and needs, this may involve individual sessions and parental work.
• Culture, Migration & Decolonial Perspectives — integrating the cultural, historical, and sociopolitical dimensions of subjective experience into the therapeutic relationship.

Andrea Santos Vermelhudo — Psychologist

Communicative, creative and empathetic, Andrea works with an evidence-based approach and is committed to creating safe, welcoming environments for her clients.

Andrea is a specialised psychologist in cognitive behavioural and integrative therapies, psychological coaching and crisis intervention. She has experience working with young adults and adults dealing with anxiety disorders, depression and personality disorders.

Her goal is to foster the growth and empowerment of every person who seeks her support, while always upholding ethical and professional standards.

Kayla Nickells — Couples Therapist & Counsellor

My work is about helping you understand yourself more deeply, so you can live a more truthful and authentic life — through somatic, attachment, and psychodynamic work.

My name is Kayla Nickells and I am a couples therapist and counsellor working with English-speakers in Lisbon and online.

Before training as a counsellor, I spent a decade founding and running Forest Schools in the United States, working closely with children, parents, and nature-based mindfulness practices. That experience shaped how I understand attunement, presence, and the body's role in emotional life — and it led me to counselling, where I have been in private practice since 2023.

I hold an MA in Clinical Mental Health Counseling, and I bring my own experience with attachment and relational struggles, parenting journeys, and trauma healing into the room — alongside professional training in Somatic Experiencing and the Gottman Method for couples.

I work with attachment, relationships, expat life, life transitions, parenthood, and self-confidence — often with clients navigating the particular disorientation of building a life abroad.

• Gottman Method — assessment-based tools for conflict, friendship, and repair, drawn from decades of couples research.
• Somatic Experiencing — working with how stress and trauma are held in the body, not only in thought.
• Internal Family Systems (IFS) — understanding the different "parts" of ourselves that hold conflicting needs and protections.
• Mindfulness-based approaches — building present-moment awareness as a foundation for change.