Long before she became a psychiatrist, Susan Wait ’73 found herself captivated by the human mind — not while in a lab or hospital but from Professor Phyllis Smith’s living room. In the intimate setting of Smith’s senior seminar on 19th-century British novels, Mount Holyoke students gathered over tea, engaging in deep discussions of what they had read. “As the semester evolved, we got to know each other and how each of us thought about things,” Wait, an English major, recalled. “It was a very rich, special experience.” Her capstone paper explored the psychological themes in Henry James’ Gothic fiction — a topic that, though she didn’t realize it at the time, foreshadowed her future career.
After spending several years working in the pharmaceutical industry and completing the post-baccalaureate pre-med program at Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania, Wait enrolled in medical school at the Medical College of Pennsylvania. She then completed a residency at Sheppard Pratt Hospital near Baltimore, Maryland. In the early ‘90s, Sheppard Pratt was already well known for being at the forefront of mental health care, though, at that time, treatment standards for complex PTSD and dissociative disorders were in their infancy. Wait took a leadership role at Sheppard Pratt, which she held for nearly three decades until her retirement in 2021. There, she shaped and led a progressive program that empowered patients to be active agents in their healing.
“My patients have internal chaos — these multiple entities within them trying to collaborate and live an effective life,” Wait said. “So, our staff felt it was important to model cooperation and to make it clear that the voice of each person on the team, especially the patient’s, was valued.” This new model of openness and cohesion was hailed in her field, and she takes pride in advancing the hospital’s legacy for excellence in mental health care.
Similarly, Wait hopes that Mount Holyoke will continue to be a place “where women feel safe, empowered and supported — to be able to grow in all directions.” This belief in part led her to name the College as a beneficiary of her retirement account and join the Mary Lyon Society. Last year, she furthered her commitment to the College by taking advantage of a new opportunity to create a charitable gift annuity using a qualified charitable distribution from her IRA.
Wait’s decision was also practical. Having read other alums’ stories, she knew that once she turned 73, she would be required to take distributions from her IRA. Using one of those distributions to fund a charitable gift annuity at Mount Holyoke allowed her to reduce her taxable income. She was also inspired by her mother, who set up a gift annuity at her alma mater, Douglass Residential College, and continues to enjoy the security of the annuity’s regular payments.
As she thinks back on her time at Mount Holyoke and teas in her professor’s living room, Wait is grateful for how the College’s atmosphere helped to shape her. “Mount Holyoke was within the world. It wasn’t walled off from what was going on socially at the time,” she said. “But it was also a sanctuary — a place where people could experiment with their identity and find who they were, safely.” From Mount Holyoke to Sheppard Pratt Hospital and back again, Wait’s commitment to fostering a culture of care endures.
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