Suzanne Spencer | Alumni

The Silver Lining

After beginning her television news career as a multimedia journalist in South Bend, Suzanne Spencer ’14 steadily climbed her way up the ranks. “It was a grind,” she says. “I worked every shift, overnights, weekends, holidays.”

Spencer eventually moved to Milwaukee, seizing an opportunity to develop her skills in a larger market. Within a few years, she had risen to the role of morning show anchor — a role that represented the culmination of all her hard work and determination. “That was the dream job for me.”

But in 2021, she received a diagnosis that would change the course of her life.

“My intuition knew something was wrong,” she recalls. “I had been having a dull, lingering headache for a couple of months. I had tried every medication my primary care doctor could throw at me, and nothing was working. So we asked for imaging, and that’s when I found the brain tumor.”

Over the span of 18 months, Spencer underwent a pair of surgeries — the first to remove the tumor located in her cavernous sinus, and a second to address complications that had arisen as a result. Along the way, she continued her work on television and also gave birth to her daughter. It was a challenging and uncertain time, testing her in ways she never imagined. Yet through it all, she refused to focus on the negatives.

“A mentor of mine always told me that the last line of your news story should be the silver lining, the thing that people can relate to and remember,” says Spencer. Although she had already been doing that in her professional life for years, her health journey presented the opportunity to apply that advice at a personal level, as well. “I truly believe that through tragic moments and hardships, good emerges. The universe blessed me with this crazy gift of a story. What I choose to do with that is on me.”

In the spring of 2024, Spencer sat down with her husband Paul Mpistolarides ’14 to discuss a seemingly crazy idea: leaving her job in television in order to launch a new career as an author and public speaker. Even though she had worked so hard to get to where she was professionally, she sensed a responsibility to leverage her story to inspire and motivate others.

“My husband asked me, ‘If you live your life and look back at having never taken the risk of telling your story through a book or public speaking, would you regret it?’ And I was like, ‘You know, I think I would.’ That became a guiding light for us. We said, ‘Alright, let’s put the plan in motion.’”

Since that pivotal conversation, Spencer has been hard at work developing a keynote message centering around the themes of mindset, inner voice and community; she’s been making connections with various groups and organizations to find the ideal audiences for her story; and she’s been laying the foundation for a book that she hopes to be pitching to agents at some point within the year. She’s also gladly ditching her 2 a.m. alarm clock and enjoying more flexibility to enjoy time with her daughter.

“At this phase in life, I just want to be able to make an impact on people and make a living
doing it,” she says. “Truly everything has prepared me for this moment.”

Looking back, Spencer recognizes that part of that preparation took place during her four years at DePauw. She’s recently been reconnecting with former professors, including her major advisor Greg Schwipps as she gets deeper into the writing process and her minor advisor Jeff McCall as she gains traction in public speaking. Both have offered advice and encouragement as she moves forward along this new path.

But perhaps the most important lesson she learned at DePauw was the courage to confront challenges with confidence. “DePauw helped me conceptualize how to process difficult things,” says Spencer. “That’s the beauty of the liberal arts education. Choosing to do hard things was always something I didn’t shy away from at DePauw.”

As she leans into the next chapter of her story, Spencer is optimistic not only about her new career path, but also about her health outlook. “From what we know, my prognosis is good,” she says. Yet no matter what happens, she’s confident that she will thrive in the face of any obstacle even as she inspires others to do the same.

“I think I will always have a relationship with my neurosurgery team because of how all of this has transpired. But I don't fear having another brain surgery, because I know now that all of this has led to a much stronger version of me that never would have existed if I didn't have that challenge right in front of me.”