Who I am
I am Meryem Erkan, a couples counsellor, scientist and former lecturer at the University of Cologne. I help couples find their love for each other again and solve their problems. I also work one to one with women, and I run events and a podcast. I live in Dubai and work online with women and couples wherever they are.
In eight years I have supported around 500 couples and roughly as many women.
I did my bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Cologne. I come from two directions, and that is decisive for my work. I know the approaches from research, because I taught them at the university. And for eight years I have seen in practice which of them actually work in couples’ everyday lives.
That is not the same thing. There are a great many relationship tips, and most of them cannot be put into practice. “Put yourself in your partner’s shoes during an argument.” That sounds right, and it does not work in the very moment you would need it. When you are angry, you cannot put yourself in someone else’s shoes.
That is why I work differently. With me, you practise beforehand, so that something is actually there to draw on in an argument. And with me, there is no nodding along, only applying. Everything we discuss, we try out in the session.
My qualifications
- Bachelor’s and master’s degrees in a two-subject programme at the University of Cologne
- Counselling research as a focus already during my studies
- Almost three years of teaching at the Chair of Counselling Research at the University of Cologne, in the subject Methods and Techniques of Counselling, for student teachers and psychology students
- Two-year further training as a couples counsellor
- Further training as an individual counsellor
- Further training in stress management
- Previously worked as a scientist at a research institute
- Eight years of practice, around 500 couples and around 500 women
- Developer of the Love Reset Method
I do not work with mental illness, neither in couples counselling nor in individual counselling. If something like that is on the table, I say so and refer you on.
Counselling in three languages
I counsel in German, Turkish and English.
That is more than a service detail. In couples with a German, Turkish or Southern European background, two ideas often collide: about what respect means and about how much closeness is normal. In some families, setting boundaries counts as disrespectful. In others, it is taken for granted. Both sides believe their own stance is the decent one.
That sits at the table in a great many conflicts, and it needs to be talked about, not skipped over.
How I work
Every collaboration starts with a single first session. In it I do an initial analysis: how do the two of you talk to each other, where do you interrupt each other, where is it really stuck. Even if the themes repeat over the years, every couple is so individual that it needs its own analysis.
Only after that do we decide together whether to continue.
My counselling takes place in video sessions. So it does not matter where you live.
One point that matters to many people: I do not take sides. Many men come worried that two women will be sitting against them here. That is exactly what does not happen, and that is why most of them stay of their own accord. Some even want more sessions afterwards, because they notice that they can open up here.
What else I do
Podcast. A new episode every week (in German). Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
MindTalk Events. My own events for women, including one with around 300 participants in a theatre hall. See impressions
Instagram. There I reach around 80,000 people, and that is where most of the questions arrive that later turn into these articles.
Private life
I am married and a mother of two.
