100 days to my PhD defence

My PhD officially ended in December 2025, but somehow life has only gotten busier since then. Without going into each development in detail (yet), I wanted to share a few updates here:

✔️ My PhD dissertation has been approved. They say it’s important to celebrate each step of the academic journey. So yes, I followed the protocol and celebrated this one—with a postdoctoral family vacation in Thailand.

🎓 My defence is scheduled for 02 June 2026 at 16:30. My dissertation title is ”𝘉𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘮𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴, 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴: 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘥𝘢𝘺 (𝘪𝘯)𝘷𝘢𝘳𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘵𝘩 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘥𝘰𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘥𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘴“. You’re very welcome to attend, either in person or online. I am reaching out to friends and colleagues. I will just assume people will be pleasantly surprised with my invitation. Haha!

🔬 I’ve started a postdoctoral position.

It’s funded by an NWO XS grant that I co-wrote with Loes Pouwels and Maaike Verhagen. This team science project brings together our research lines on peer relationships and loneliness, alongside methodological innovation using Bray-Curtis dissimilarity. I feel like this has inserted a coin to my “game over” state as a researcher. So nice that I can stick around for another 1 year!

📍 I’ve also started my private practice in Rotterdam.

Setting everything up has taken more work than I imagined, including the website and the physical office, but I’m now available for in-person psychotherapy in Rotterdam every Thursday afternoon. Thanks genAI for saving me hours in making a website. And thanks Li Zhi for making renting a physical office possible!

So yes, I’m very much 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘮𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴, and between life phases. Grateful to carry research and practice side by side into what comes next.