Dr. Alessia Ranieri

Dr. Alessia Ranieri is an English-speaking psychologist and psychotherapist working in Lucca and Pietrasanta and online with people living elsewhere in Italy and abroad, in English and Italian, with adolescents, adults, couples and professionals.

She graduated with honours in Psychology from the University of Padua and specialised in psychotherapy at the Institute of Constructivist Psychology. She also holds a PhD in Leadership Development from Henley Business School in the United Kingdom and lectures in Adolescent Psychology.

Her approach is constructivist: therapy is not a catalogue of standard solutions but a collaborative process of exploration, in which your experience is read through your relationships, your history and the meanings you have attached to them. She works with Personal Construct Psychology techniques, including self-characterisation and fixed role therapy, and with acceptance-based methods.

Four areas define her practice, and three of them are hard to find together: identity and life transitions, particularly in adolescence and early adulthood; relocation, mobility and cross-cultural life; intercultural couples and family dynamics; and work stress, leadership pressure and burnout.

That combination is unusual for a specific reason. The person who moves country for a senior role is carrying two things at once: a job with responsibility and no safety net, and a life that has to be rebuilt from scratch outside it. Most therapists are equipped for one or the other. Her PhD in leadership and her years in multicultural environments, in both the public and private sector, cover both.

She lived in London, and describes herself as suited to expats and international patients looking for a therapist who understands how culture, mobility and identity shape emotional wellbeing. That is a claim with evidence behind it rather than a line of positioning.

You do not have to pick her yourself. At Therapsy every person is matched by a human being, not by an algorithm: our clinical team reads your request, and if Dr. Ranieri is the right fit for what you are bringing, they will introduce you. The first call is free, and it is there to check that the fit is real before anything begins.

Fewer than 1 in 100 therapists joins the Therapsy team. Dr. Ranieri was personally vetted by our Clinical Director, Dr. Francesca A. Boccalari, on three non-negotiable criteria: she shares our values, she speaks at least one language beyond Italian, and she has a physical practice in Lucca where you can meet in person, not only online.

Alessia Ranieri does not work alone. She takes part in Therapsy’s internal clinical supervision, a standing group where therapists bring their most demanding cases, train together and ask for help when a situation calls for it. Every therapist in the network, Case Managers included, can turn to our Clinical Director for clinical questions and further training, and Therapsy runs regular professional training with senior therapists and external trainers. Scheduling, invoicing, payments and the rest of the paperwork are handled by Therapsy, so that her time with you stays clinical work and nothing else. On your side, the same platform gives you one place to see your sessions, invoices, payments and documents.

At Therapsy you do not have to pick your therapist from a list: you start by speaking with Dr. Francesca Boccalari, our Clinical Director, who listens to what you are going through and matches you with the therapist she believes is right for you: Alessia Ranieri, or one of her colleagues. Then you have a free introductory call with that therapist, and only after that do you decide whether to start.

And if the fit turns out not to be right, you are not back at square one. Dr. Boccalari and her team find you another therapist inside Therapsy, at no cost, without you having to tell your story from the beginning. Choosing a therapist while you are struggling, in a language that is not your own, is a lot to ask of a person. That is the part we take on.

Dr. Ranieri is registered with the Italian Order of Psychologists. She receives in Lucca and Pietrasanta and works online with patients across Italy and abroad.

Further reading from Therapsy: the signs of expat burnout, therapy for intercultural couples.