Saumya Dave

Saumya Dave is a writer, psychiatrist, and mental health advocate.

As a writer, she enjoys exploring the unique dynamics that exist in families. Her second novel, What a Happy Family, will be published in June 2021. Her debut novel, Well-Behaved Indian Women, was featured in The New York Times Book Review, ELLE, Bustle, Buzzfeed, and more. Saumya's essays, articles, and poetry have been in outlets including The New York Times, ABC News, Refinery29, and HuffPost, among others.

Saumya has a passion for women’s mental health and wellness. She and her husband, Samir Sheth, founded thisisforHER, a nonprofit which uses art therapy to improve mental health awareness and education for women and girls in low- and middle-income countries. She is a practicing therapist, as well as an Adjunct Professor of Psychiatry at Mount Sinai, where she teaches Narrative Medicine.

Saumya was born in India and grew up in Atlanta. In her seventh-grade journal, she wrote: "I will be a psychiatrist and writer someday". She is a graduate of Georgia Tech and the Medical College of Georgia, where she was an inductee into the Gold Humanism Honor Society. She completed her Psychiatry Residency at Mount Sinai Beth Israel, where she was a Chief Resident and an inductee into the AΩA Medical Honors Society. She completed a Psychoanalytic Fellowship with the New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute.