If you’d like to talk with me more about graduate school – something with which I am intimately familiar – feel free to drop me a line. Some aspects of grad school will vary from program to program, and others are more or less consistent no matter where you go.

I’d say more here, but that would take a long time.

People switch jobs or careers on average 3x in their 30s. This isn’t crazy, it’s a smart step.

I’d love to hear details! What kind of school are you looking at? What do you want to do?

Don’t worry about the resume. As zuzu said, you have great experience to put down, and an interesting story. I was able to somehow disguise the 2 years as a Vegas stripper with various assorted crap, you have a whole lot more to work with.

If you’d like a second look on the resume from someone in the career biz, please don’t hesitate — you know my email.

I had so many problems with math and foreign languages in college that I was eventually diagnosed with a learning disability. My dean waived the language courses, and I was allowed into special ed courses for the math. Of course, my GPA was in shambles by then.

But I don’t care. I’m very good in my major, and my grad school applications will be mailed next month. We can’t go through life thinking in terms of what we can’t do.

I wish the best for you, Lauren.

Don’t worry about the GPA. I got into a very very good law school with barely a 3.0. My college transcript has at least one of every grade except for an F — and the really funny part is that I got my D- in Constitutional Law, of all things. There’s a reason for that related to the freakiness of the professor and how stretched thin I was back then. But in the end, what mattered more was my LSAT and other factors such as the fact that I’d been working for a few years as a newspaper reporter.

You’ve got interesting life story written all over you, the kind that grad schools like to see. You got derailed from your original plan when you got pregnant, then got back on track and got your degree while raising your son and starting a big-ass feminist blog. That math grade isn’t going to matter all that much against that background.

Best of luck to you, for sure. I’m still trying to figure out how to make this whole school thing work, but I’m ridiculously glad I’m doing it.

Also, think about reporting “Major GPA” in your field of specialization (like, if your math is the pits but your concentration was social studies and you got all A grades there). There are ways around. One of the guys in my doctoral program had a really, truly shitty undergrad GPA but got in because he was able to make the argument – about a double major – that the one he was pursuing grad work in was an A/B average and his other major (a very hard science that he pursued for intellectual curiosity) was where all the Ds resided. In addition, contacting the Graduate Director (or similar title) of the program you are applying to is often helpful. Show that person that you are bright, motivated and capable, and it can often grease the skids for department admissions committees (and getting TA assignments offering small wages and benefits).

Yes, you can!