My name is Anna Zakaidze. I am a clinical psychologist, hypnotherapist, trauma therapist, EMDR practitioner, and family therapist. I have been practicing for over six years. I want to tell you about myself, my work, and why it is important for me to participate in the project to create help centers for women and children.
I became a member of the Regional Public Organization ‘International Women‘s Union‘ — a community that unites professionals who share the values of support, preservation of traditional family foundations, and assistance to women.
When I was asked to join the community and this project, I agreed without hesitation. Because I understand: in a crisis situation, especially in hot spots, psychological help is often the last priority. Food, shelter, safety — these are primary and necessary. But when basic needs are met, another question arises: how to deal with what is inside? With feelings of loss, fear, anger, the inability to come to an agreement with loved ones even on the simplest things. With children who have stopped sleeping and started being afraid of loud noises. With husbands who have become distant. With your own feeling that the ground is slipping from under your feet.
I know this state not only as a specialist.
Personal journey: from pain to profession
My professional journey did not begin at university. It began with a personal experience that I would not wish on anyone.
I went through a difficult divorce. Through betrayal. Through the tragic death of my mother almost simultaneously with the birth of my long-awaited son after 15 years of infertility. I know what it is like to be completely alone with a baby in your arms. Without support, without resources, without knowing how to go on. This state is extremely difficult — physically, emotionally, and morally. When you don’t sleep at night not only because the baby is small, but because anxiety keeps your eyes open. When you need to be an adult, solve everyday problems, earn money, smile at people — while inside there is emptiness and pain.
I know firsthand what it’s like to wake up in the morning and the first thing you remember is: this person is gone. Or: this person you trusted did something to you that you couldn’t even imagine in your worst nightmare. And next to you is a child who needs a mother. Not an ideal, all-powerful one, but a living, stable one.
I put myself back together piece by piece. I tried different approaches, looked for what really works. Not just temporarily alleviates the condition, but changes it fundamentally. It was important for me not just to survive that period, but to emerge from it with inner support. So that my child would have an emotionally healthy mother. That became my main motivation.
The tools that I discovered and tested on myself back then now form the basis of my professional work. EMDR, hypnotherapy, trauma work methods, techniques for recovering from loss and betrayal — none of these are abstract concepts. I know how they feel from the other side, from the client’s side. And this understanding greatly changes the quality of therapy.
Фото: Анна Закаидзе
What I work with and who my clients are
Today, the main areas of my practice are family therapy, trauma work, relationship crises, parent-child relationships, divorces, infidelity, and the consequences of arguments and conflicts. Couples on the verge of separation come to me. Parents who have lost contact with their teenagers come. Women who, after divorce or loss, cannot return to a full life come. People who have experienced events that continue to affect them years later come.
Over six-plus years of practice, several hundred families have gone through my work. I say “preserved,” and for me this means that people not only formally stayed married but found a way to continue living together meaningfully. Or, if separation was inevitable, they went through it with minimal losses for each other and for the children. Sometimes preserving a family is not about “staying together” but about “staying human.”
Among my clients are top business executives, politicians, and high-level experts. These people are accustomed to controlling processes and making decisions that others depend on. But when it comes to personal matters — home, children, a partner — the usual levers of control stop working. In the consulting room, this becomes obvious very quickly. Status, money, power do not protect against pain. They can create a comfortable shell, but inside, a person remains alone with their trauma, their fear, their loneliness.
Tools I use
I work in an integrative approach. This means that I do not limit myself to talk therapy. My arsenal includes methods aimed at deeper layers of the psyche — hypnotherapy and EMDR (a scientifically proven method approved by the WHO for trauma work).
Traumatic experiences, especially those involving loss, violence, or betrayal, are often not “recorded” in the form of a story that can be retold in words. They remain in the body, in automatic reactions, in inexplicable outbursts of anger or fear. A person may understand intellectually that the threat is gone, but the body continues to live in danger mode. EMDR and hypnotherapy make it possible to process this experience at the level of the nervous system. After such work, constant tension dissipates, sleep improves, and the ability to respond to events adequately in the present moment emerges.
In family therapy, I often combine work with the couple and individual trauma work with each partner. Because the conflict between husband and wife often turns out to be a clash of two traumatized parts that are defending themselves from each other, not attacking.
About the project to help women and children
When I learned about the community’s plans to create help centers in hot spots, I realized that my experience could be directly applied here — both professional and personal.
Women and children in conflict zones face multilayered trauma. Loss of home, loss of loved ones, violence, uncertainty about the future. On top of this are ordinary human difficulties: marital conflicts that become exacerbated to the extreme in a stressful environment, children’s fears that mothers have no resources to deal with.
I know what it’s like for a woman to be left alone with a child. I know how hard it is to remain stable when everything inside is collapsing. And I know that there is a way out of this state. Not fast, not easy, but there is.
I do not believe that a psychologist should “save” anyone. I believe that the specialist’s task is to give a person support, tools, and an understanding of what is happening to them. So that they themselves can stand up and move forward. This is especially true for women with children. Because a child’s state directly depends on the mother’s state. I have learned this from my own experience.
Within the framework of the project, it is important not just to provide counseling, but to participate in creating a system where help is available not just once, but on an ongoing basis. So that a woman knows: there is a place she can come to with her child, where she will be listened to without judgment, where she will be helped to cope with anxiety, fear, and helplessness. Where she will be helped to reconnect with her child. Where she can begin to recover.
I am grateful to the community for the invitation and trust. I am ready to share my materials on social networks and on the community’s website. These will be practical things: how to cope with acute conditions, how to talk to children about difficult things, how to maintain relationships during periods of high stress, how to find support when it seems there is none.
My path is a path from personal pain to professional help for others. I am not sharing this to evoke pity. I am sharing this so that it is clear: I am not a theorist. I am a practitioner who has walked my own stretch of a difficult road and knows how to guide others along it.
Professional credentials and contacts of Anna Zakaidze
Clinical psychologist, hypnotherapist. Personal psychologist to top executives.
Projects and courses:
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Author of the “Transformation” project for experts — a 3-week program that addresses key pains: transitioning from constant doubt to action, working with the inner critic, imposter syndrome and fears hindering progress, and launching sales of one’s services.
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Author of a course on the psychology of money, combining economic, psychological, and energetic knowledge, practices, and tools.
Membership in professional organizations:
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Member of the OPPPL (All-Russian Professional Psychotherapeutic League)
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Resident of business clubs (“Krona”, “SuperMamaClub”, “MirBusinessMam”, and others)
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Member of the Regional Public Organization “International Women’s Union”
Clients: Businessmen, entrepreneurs, political figures, top managers, experts. More than 1,000 clients worldwide (including Georgia, France, Spain, USA).
Media expert: Channel 1, Moskva24, RBC, Psychologies, Marie Claire, Arguments and Facts, and others.
Awards: Laureate of the “Best Psychologist of the Year” award at the Kremlin, 2025.
Фото: Анна Закаидзе
Education and key programs:
- Pedagogical education (History and Law, UGPI)
- Economic education (Finance and Credit, PIGMU)
- Psychological Counseling (MAEO)
- Clinical Psychology (MIP)
- Hypnotherapy, Body Trances and Hypnosis (MUIP, MIG)
- MBA, Open European Academy of Economics & Politics, Body Trances and Hypnosis
- EMDR (MUIP)
- Mesmerism (MIG)
- Program “Psychotypes and Profiling: Practical Course for Psychologists” (MIP)
- Program “Fundamentals of Negotiation in Life and Business” (RUDN University)
- Course “Voice. Speech. Public Speaking. Voice Can” (S. Kasparova)
- Marketing course “Master of Scaling” (M. Afonin)
- Course on Eastern Psychology (R. Blekt)
- Course “Biography Healing” (YOUGURU school)
Services: Individual consultation | Personal therapy | Hypnotherapy | Trauma therapy (EMDR) | Family therapy | Parent-child relationships | Small group therapy | Offline and online formats | Courses, marathons, programs | Closed club
Client issues I work with:
- Personal growth, advancement, self-expression, relationships (with spouses, children, relatives, colleagues)
- Family counseling (divorce, infidelity, crisis, arguments, infertility, parent-child relationships)
- Self-expression and personal branding for experts and entrepreneurs (fear of publicity, working with the inner critic and imposter syndrome)
- Financial “ceilings,” difficulties, fears
- Solving business issues through personal therapy
Contacts:
- Phone: +7 926 654 68 03
- Telegram: @Anna_Zakaidze_psy
- VKontakte: @annazakaidze
- Website: https://zakaidze-psy.ru/