Dr. Anne K Eshelman, devoted wife, mother, grandmother, psychologist, mentor, and friend, passed away surrounded by the love of the family she spent her life nurturing. She was 73 years old.

Born on June 17, 1952, in Oak Park, Illinois, she learned resilience and responsibility at an early age. After her mother’s death when she was just two years old, she became a caretaker to her siblings. It was a role she never stopped playing - caring for others was the defining thread of her life.

As a child, she escaped into books and became an avid reader, a lifelong passion she would later pass on to her children and grandchildren. She loved visiting the library and spending summers at the family cottage in Harbert, Michigan. She learned early the value of hard work and remained deeply action-oriented throughout her life. One of the highest compliments she could pay someone was to call them “hard-working.” She believed in doing what needed to be done and showing up for others.

She attended Earlham College, where she met the love of her life, George, on September 20, 1970, during freshman orientation at the Quaker Meeting House. They built a relationship that spanned 56 years and served as the foundation of everything that followed. At Earlham, she excelled academically, earning election to Phi Beta Kappa and graduating with a degree in psychology. She researched Raynaud’s disease through Harvard Medical School and studied in London, experiences she remembered fondly throughout her life.

After graduation, she worked for the Illinois Children’s Home and Aid Society, transporting foster children to appointments and assisting in preschool programs. The work reflected her inclination to care for vulnerable people and confirmed her desire to pursue psychology professionally.

She earned her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Wayne State University in 1980 and joined Henry Ford Hospital, where she would spend the next four decades building an extraordinary career. Beginning in consultation psychiatry and later becoming a Senior Staff Psychologist, she helped pioneer the integration of health psychology into medical care, particularly within organ transplantation.

Working closely with heart, lung, and kidney transplant recipients and donors, she recognized that successful treatment required more than medical expertise alone. Patients also needed emotional support, behavioral guidance, and strong social networks. She often described her work as helping ordinary people navigate extraordinary medical circumstances.

At a time when health psychology was not widely integrated into transplant programs, she helped demonstrate its value and establish it as an essential component of patient care. Over the course of her career, she built one of the nation’s leading health psychology programs, ultimately assembling a team of 25 doctoral-level psychologists whose work continues to support patients throughout the Henry Ford Health System today.

Her contributions earned national recognition. She was named a Fellow of the American Psychological Association’s Society for Clinical Health Psychology and received numerous honors, including the Timothy Jeffrey Memorial Award for Outstanding Contributions to Clinical Health Psychology in 2007, the Henry Ford Health System Shadow of the Leader Award in 2016, and the inaugural Clinical Excellence in Transplantation Award from the Henry Ford Transplant Institute in 2018. She was also recognized six times as Teacher of the Year for her dedication to training medical students and psychiatry residents.

Inspired by her love of crochet and her desire to comfort patients and families facing transplantation, she transformed a personal hobby of making afghans into a community-wide effort. Family, friends, and patients contributed crocheted squares that she assembled into thousands of afghans. They were given to transplant donors, recipients, and their families as symbols of comfort, hope, and healing. It was a perfect expression of who she was: someone who saw an opportunity to help and found a way to multiply her impact by bringing others along.

While she accomplished a great deal professionally, family was always the center of her life. She built a nationally recognized career while still picking John and Sara up from school, attending baseball games, and swim meets. She showed her family that they came first and that they were deeply loved.

Becoming a grandmother brought some of the happiest years of her life. She delighted in introducing her grandchildren to books, libraries, gardening, swimming, and the natural world. She planned FaceTime calls with the same thoughtfulness she brought to everything else, creating games, quizzes, and activities to make every interaction memorable. She crocheted an eight-foot snake for her grandson Adrien and made him elaborate Halloween costumes; she delighted in art projects and gardening with Emma, and always was eager to FaceTime when Maddie asked to “call grandma”. She always made her grandkids feel like the center of the universe.

Her joy came not only from family but also from small pleasures. She loved the scent of lilacs and peonies, the sight of butterflies in her garden, bluebirds nesting in her birdhouse, and reading at the beach. She was an avid gardener who carefully researched native plants and pollinators, creating beautiful spaces that attracted birds, butterflies, and neighbors alike. She loved golf and played regularly with friends and with George, though she often measured a round less by her score than by the wildlife she spotted and the conversations she shared.

She and George were the love of one another’s lives. They built a life rich in simple joys: playing golf, watching Jeopardy, spending time at the beach, taking long drives to visit family, and enjoying the company of close friends. Their devotion to one another was evident to everyone who knew them.

Those who knew her will remember her warmth, humility, and quiet competence. She was often the smartest person in the room, but never the one seeking recognition. Friends describe her as dependable, thoughtful, modest, kind, and endlessly generous.

Her legacy lives on in the thousands of patients she supported, the students she mentored, the profession she helped shape, and most of all in the family she loved so deeply. She leaves behind her beloved husband, George; her children, Sara and John; her grandchildren Adrien, Emma, and Madelyn; her sisters Barbara, Kirsten, Karen, and Kristine; her brother Thomas; and countless friends, colleagues, students, and patients whose lives she enriched.

Her example endures in books shared with children, gardens carefully tended, acts of kindness offered without expectation of recognition, and lives touched by her extraordinary capacity to care for others.

A Celebration of Life will be held on July 11, 2026 at 3:00pm EST at the Plantation House, 222 Plantation Circle, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL 32082.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Henry Ford Transplant Institute.

When donating, you may mail a check made out to “Transplant Institute Fund”, specifying in memory of Dr. Anne Eshelman, to 1 Ford Place, Suite 5A, Detroit, MI 48202, Attn: Gift Processing. For online donations, please follow this link - click “Direct my gift to” and specify “Transplant Institute - Center for Living Donation”. Under Honoree Information, please select “In Memory of” and specify Dr. Anne Eshelman.