Brussels has a specific and slightly strange problem: a very large international population, and a treatment landscape divided by language.
For the EU institutions, NATO, the law firms, the lobbying world and the international schools, the practical difficulty is not that Belgium lacks clinicians. It is finding a specialist who works in your language, in a professional world that does not intersect with your own. In a city where a great many people’s colleagues, neighbours and children’s classmates come from the same few thousand households, that second condition is harder than it sounds.
In both languages, and why it matters
I am French and I practise in French and English. For eating disorder work this is more than convenience.
Shame is held in the language it was learned in. So is the vocabulary of the body, of family meals, of what was said at the table when you were nine. People frequently find that one language gives them access to material the other keeps at a comfortable distance, and it is not always the language they work in.
The specialism
My professional doctorate at the University of Essex was on male eating disorders, from the perspective of analytical psychology. Male presentations remain the widest gap between need and provision almost everywhere, and Brussels is no exception: men rarely present, are rarely asked, and are frequently missed by clinicians trained on female populations.
I also treat the addiction that so often accompanies an eating disorder. In a city with the professional drinking culture Brussels has, that combination is common and is usually one problem rather than two.
Practical
Sessions by secure video, Brussels being one hour ahead of London. In person in central London when you are travelling. Nothing held in Belgium, and nothing disclosed to any employer, institution or insurer without your consent, save for the narrow legal and safeguarding limits every registered practitioner is bound by, which are explained at the outset.
Once to three times a week at the start, reducing as things steady. How the frequency works.
UKCP-registered psychotherapist and Jungian analyst, HCPC-registered art psychotherapist. Both registers are public.
Dr Philippe Jacquet is a UKCP registered psychotherapist, a Jungian analyst and an HCPC registered art psychotherapist, with twenty-five years of clinical practice. His Doctorate of Professional Practice at the University of Essex examined male eating disorders from the perspective of analytical psychology. Registration can be checked on either public register.
How the work is delivered from here
All international sessions are by secure video, in English or French. Online therapy is not a reduced version of consulting room work: it is the format that lets weekly work survive living abroad, travelling, or relocating. Sessions run in United Kingdom hours, which suits most regions, and if your time zone makes none of it workable, say so when you enquire rather than assuming it rules you out.
For clinicians and treatment services
Dr Jacquet supervises clinical teams in private residential addiction treatment and in a private psychiatric hospital. For treatment centres, psychiatric units and group practices looking for external clinical supervision, including in places where no supervisor of this seniority is available locally, team supervision is also delivered by video. For individual practitioners, see clinical supervision.
Common questions
Can we work in French?
Yes, and often it is the better choice for this material. I am French and practise in both languages.
Do you work with staff from the EU institutions?
Yes. Confidentiality from any employer or institution is absolute without your consent, save for the narrow legal and safeguarding limits every registered practitioner is bound by, which are explained at the outset, and nothing is held in Belgium.
Do you work with men?
Yes, as a particular specialism. My doctoral research at the University of Essex was on male eating disorders, which remain the widest gap between need and provision almost everywhere.