Minds we Meet—Interviewing Students Like You!

Might as Well Face it, She's Addicted to Scrubs

Katy Lowe is a 29-year-old mother of three.  She has been a student with AU since November 2017 and is currently finishing up her first set of finals.  One of the few that are born and raised and currently living in Calgary, Alberta, she looks forward to chinooks to break up long, bitter cold winters.  She enjoys running along the amazing trails Calgary has to offer and has a self-proclaimed “TV problem,” enjoying her favorites on repeat while keeping warm.

What are you studying at AU?

I am currently studying psychology at AU.  I have 3 children, 2 of them with special needs.  In my experience with raising them and bringing them to daily therapy sessions and learning about their behaviors and how to help them sparked my own love and passion for the field.  As they became a little less intense and dependent I decided to pursue a career in it, which led me to the stepping stones of an undergrad majoring in psychology.

Did you go to post-secondary prior to AU?

Oh, this is a fun question.  Yes and no.  When I was 17/18 I was a student at the U of C.  I was there on several scholarships and determined to pursue a degree in sociology.  I decided in all of my 17 years that I was grown up and at the same time as starting university I should move out.  Also, I determined that I needed my own one-bedroom apartment, not a studio, not a basement suite and not in residency.  Huge mistake.  Apartments mean rent, so then I needed a full-time job.  You can see where this is going I’m sure, I had six courses I was registered in, worked 40 hours a week and at the same time testing the boundaries of my new-found freedom and independence.

My studies suffered.  I had the sensibility to withdraw from one particularly boring class.  One day on a whim, I met a man from the Internet (this was back in 2006 when this sort of thing was very strange).  I was very reluctant to meet someone online, I made sure to have my friends know my location at all times, including sitting in the restaurant pretending to be there alone watching as I met this stranger.

I quickly fell in love and within a few weeks he was inviting me to go to Mexico with him.  Being the incredibly ridiculous child that I was I agreed, neglecting my school work – too ashamed to withdraw and just ran away from my problems at school, ran all the way to Mexico.

I did marry that guy, so I mean that worked out.  However, now as an adult wanting to pursue education I have a great big 0.0 GPA stamped on my record as a result of a mistake I made as a child.  The avenue to post-secondary for me was a school that looked at my potential and not my past misgivings. This school was AU, whose requirements were only to be over 16 and then prove myself within my courses, so here I am.

What has been your most enjoyable AU course that you would recommend to other students?

Math 215 surprisingly! I decided to take the courses I dreaded the most first and this included Math 215 (Stats) and it turned out to be my favorite! As interesting as I’ve found other courses to be in terms of material, I loved that the math course was just black and white answers – nothing open to interpretation.  It was like solving a puzzle at the end of a stressful day trying to learn other course work.

What are your academic goals for 2018?

For 2018, I am finishing my first semester this February, which I am really looking forward to.  Validating that I CAN, in fact, get a degree.  I plan to finish another 2 semesters following this.

What are you hoping to do with your education from AU?

And again my rambles above kind of answer this one.  I am hoping to be a psychologist working with developmental disorders in children, such as ASD, ADHD, DCD, etc.

What is one thing you would like to complete personally in 2018?

Well I used to run marathons.  I loved running (not in the moment, but after when I’d get a medal), and in 2017 I was diagnosed with a neuromuscular autoimmune disease, myasthenia gravis.  It affects your voluntary muscles, which means my mobility was compromised, by ability to talk, eat, swallow and breathe, etc. It was pretty horrible.  Anyway, the upside of this is that it progressed enough for me to be approved for a specific mononuclear treatment which I was given in December and will continue to get every 4-6 months for the rest of my life – and it essentially handed me my life back.  So I’m able to walk unassisted again even which is amazing.  I recently started running again, and although its teeny tiny runs compared to what I used to do – for me, I’d like to run a half marathon again in 2018 – not a full one like I used to as I don’t have the time to train for that anymore but a half one and I’ll be very very happy!

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

In school! Ha but seriously I see myself *just* graduating from my undergrad and hopefully pursuing a Master’s degree.  😊

What is the last book you read?

I’m in the middle of the outlander series.  I love it and read a little bit before bed every night, it’s a great way to decompress from my school work, or else I fall asleep too focused on topics I was reading earlier and wake up exhausted from doing math in my sleep all night!

What show do you think everyone should binge watch?

I binge watch Scrubs and Friends and Grey’s Anatomy.  Repeatedly.  It drives my husband crazy because I keep restarting them over and over and although it’s clear I’ve seen them all, I love them, and I’m not sure I’d ever tire of them.  The people who haven’t seen Scrubs? I mean, come on.  Hilarious.

My love for Scrubs is so strong that I have named one of my children and one of my dogs after characters in the show.  In fact, I have used many shows for naming inspiration.

My dogs are Jack, Swarley and Turk.  Jack was named from Will & Grace (from a LONG time ago!).  Swarley is named from How I met your Mother and Turk is from Scrubs.

My oldest child is 7 and named Elliette (from Scrubs too see? Different spelling though), my middle daughter Taylor (I tried for Jordan, also from Scrubs, but my husband put a stop to the TV names here) is 6 and my son, Evan is 4.

How do you make cold winter days more enjoyable?

By not leaving the house! When it’s truly bitter and snowing, I make a stark contrast by wearing the fluffiest, warmest pjs and slippers, drinking hot coffee and watching the snow fall as I’m incredibly toasty inside!

[While we did a few student interviews this year, this one caught the attention of students because of the similarity with many of our stories – AU is often a plan B for people who’ve found their first choice (of career, of school, etc) didn’t work out as expected.]