You are techY podcast

  • with Ellen Twomey
Inspiring interviews, simple-to-understand training and tech coaching so you can GET TECHY!

Episode #135 - Alex Courts - Getting Hired While Pregnant II

About This Podcast

Alex Courts had no idea she would be hired in a UX and project management role only weeks after starting as a student with You are techY. She is our fastest hire at the best pay rate ever in the history of You are techY students. Tune in to hear how she leveraged her highly valuable previous healthcare experience to get hired so quickly and how she did so while pregnant. 

In This Episode, you'll hear...
  • >> Special guest Alex Courts

  • >> How Vanessa went from being a physical therapist to UX professional while pregnant

  • >> Why having a unique and varied set of skills is highly valuable in tech

Transcript

Ellen (00:00):

You are listening to the You are techY podcast, episode number 135.

Voiceover (00:10):

Welcome to the You are techY podcast where it’s all about growing in your techy-ness. So you can find the tech job of your dreams. And now your host, technology learning coach, Ellen Twomey.

Ellen (00:26):

So many moms returning to work have asked me how to get hired in a job that pays well, but also allows them to be the mom they wanna be.And I’ve seen so many make the mistake of taking a job, teaching English at 3:00 AM for $15 an hour. And that’s just backwards because your skills are highly valuable. And so is your time. That’s why I put together free training to help you jumpstart your tech career by learning about the fields of UX design and front end. So you don’t waste time on one more side hustle that isn’t a career. It doesn’t give you the flexibility and income your family needs. I only offer these trainings twice a year and it’s available right now at the release of this episode. So sign up now for the helpful and interactive free training, three strategies to jumpstart your UX design career or three strategies to jumpstart your front end development career. Sign up for one the other or both. It’s all free. Go to youaretechy.com/signup. That’s Y O U A R E T E C H Y.com/S I G N U P. I’ll see you there.

Ellen (01:17):

Alex Courts is a former physical therapist, turned UX engineer and entrepreneur. She’s also a mom with one on the way. She has an undergrad and biomedical engineering from the Ohio state university, as well as a doctorate in physical therapy. Alex is no stranger to traditional education, but when it came to breaking into tech, she knew she needed a scraper approach. That’s when Alex used her own company, vibrant physical therapy to demonstrate her UX skills in land. Her first highly paid UX freelance job as a contractor for a digital agency. Alex’s current role in interactive design combines everything from discovery to product management, to design. As she supports digital product teams at a nonprofit organization, creating a more cohesive user experience.

Ellen (02:18):

Alex lives in Cincinnati, Ohio with her daughter Reagan, her husband, Dylan, and they will welcome their newest daughter in October. That’s right. Alex got hired while pregnant and at AUR techie alum record rate. I might add Alex, welcome to the show.

Alex (02:35):

Thanks Ellen. Thanks for having me. And I loved how you included like the Ohio state university for Michigan. It’s hard to say, but I <laugh> weekend. In fact, we were at the lake this weekend with friend and our friend went to the Ohio state university and he snuck a picture with his visor on the baby. And he did a selfie, but when we weren’t even looking, oh no, oh no. Like he even said it to all of us, our Michigan friends. And he went to Michigan state and he’s like a, he’s like, we’ve got some bad influences down here in Atlanta. <laugh> there you go.

Ellen (03:09):

Now you’re gonna have to get some Michigan gear. There you go. Michigan have actually Michigan state here. Kevin will have party gear. He’ll put some spark here. Could send it that one. That is much more acceptable to me. Okay, there you go. <laugh> I love it. All right. I wanna dive right in. This is gonna be super fun. Our audience is gonna love your story, but tell us in your own words, why did you break into tech? I mean, I know we have a lot of healthcare professionals that come to the program, but you have, you worked at this whole therapy for quite a while. What made you really ultimately kind of settle it on making this change and ultimately breaking back? 

Alex:

Yeah. Great question. Ellen. I feel like I asked myself this for years of like, what’s my next thing? Where am I going?

Alex (03:56):

What am I gonna be when I grow up? No, I’m in healthcare fair. Yeah. I feel like the question really started for me, not exactly breaking into tech or realizing I wanted to do that, but realizing that healthcare wasn’t right for me. So if we have, you know, healthcare providers listening in that might be a first step, then that’s great. If you’re here listening, I’ll encourage you. So really when I was in healthcare, I just started realizing that I didn’t quite feel like I fit in all the time. Something just did not feel right in my everyday work. I loved helping people. I still loved my coworkers. I didn’t necessarily love the hospital setting. The more and more I started exploring options. The more I felt like there was something different out there for me. So as you probably heard from the intro, I do have a background in engineering.

Ellen (04:52):

And even with that background in engineering, it took me so long. Like I think I was a physical therapist solely practicing physical therapy for six, and it probably took me at least four to really shift and start exploring tech. So I am so thankful that I found you. And to be honest with you, as part of my story, the way I found you was that I experienced a loss in my life and my, my daughter Remy. So I have it an older daughter. Right. And it’s three. And then my daughter Remy was born almost a year ago now. And she was still born. We watched her at that time and it just was a breaking point almost for me. How do I take care of myself? What do I really want in life? Because when you experience something, so life changing, right, right. The value of life, like grows in your mind, just a little bit more, a little more aware.

Alex (05:54):

And I didn’t want to waste my life, you know, feeling this angst about like, is there more that I could be doing? That’s more fulfilling after that is around the time I started hearing your podcast. And you were just speaking to me in ways of growing in a new direction and hope that I really needed. So you, I think it’s record of that journey. I’m so glad. 

Ellen:
And I have like all these chills up, of course, I know your story and it’s such a, it’s so powerful and beautiful. I mean, first, just to overcome, like just to survive that awful tragedy is just so beautiful. And so I just commend you that you survived through that and then took it as a source of how to live your life, you know, even greater. I mean, it’s like, it’s so cliche, the song like to live, like you were dying, but the point is like, truly you can spend every day doing something you don’t wanna do, or you can spend every day, you know, being excited for Monday and wanting to live as you fully alive, you know?

Alex (06:57):

Yes, yes. And, you know, I didn’t even really realize that was possible for so long in healthcare. I thought, you know, like this is just how people feel about work. Again, I loved like helping patients, but you know, there was a part of me that just didn’t enjoy going into a hospital setting and I don’t know. 

Ellen: 

Right, right. It’s hard to go into that is possible. Yeah. I love it. Love it. It is possible if this is the path for you. Well, I’m glad that the podcast spoke to you and that it was meaningful and helped you, you know, kind of come to that conclusion cuz I mean, it was a journey for you, but from our perspective, when you joined the program, because we like, you didn’t even get through the program, and I was like, I like, you’re hired and it’s this awesome rate.

Ellen (07:40):

And it’s like, it seems so fast. You know, sometimes your brain, depending on how long your brain has been wrapping its head around really making that change. It can seem, you know, it can seem fast for other people, so, okay, sure. What is your new job? Like, you know, what do you do? What’s the team like, what’s the most fun part let’s get into kind of the nitty gritty about what you’re doing. You have a very cool UX engineering job. 

Alex:
Yes. Yeah. So my job is very unique. I remember when Ella and I were first talking about the job, it was hard to even define the role because it is so unique and different, but to break it down and simplify it, mostly what my role is transitioning at my client from having a website in an app that functions relatively independently and trying to help the product teams make the user experience between at least those two and some other digital products, more cohesive.

Alex (08:40):

So for me a day in my role could look like anything from doing discovery. I get to do a lot of sharing vision with teams, sharing, research, strategy, insights, those kind of things, but also really getting to do, do even some. What I’ll say is like products or more platform management. I have specific product managers with teams that I’m working with, but I’m helping them at a little bit higher level looking across the platform as a whole. And I get to do user flows and I get to create Miro boards that help people brainstorm. And I get to see the designs of all the teams and give my input. So it’s really fun and very unique. 

Ellen: 

Can you talk just from my own personal interest level, one of my former podcast, guests went over to Miro and I I’ve heard a lot of people say that Miro boards are really working for them.

Ellen (09:33):

Can you just talk a little bit more about how you’re using whatever you said, brainstorming and how else are you using those?

Alex: 

Sure. Yeah. So I do put some user flows in there. Honestly, a lot of my work is very collaborative with teams, so I may make the user flow, but then I will what I’ll say socialize that in terms of getting other people’s feedback. So honestly, sometimes what I’m looking at is processes across a team and how that user is experiencing that process. Yeah. So we may be brainstorming, say changing a process and we’ll all be able to I’ll, you know, create the user flow in Miro and then we’ll use like sticky notes to kind of talk about like the different parts of the process. Yeah. What the risks are with changing that part of the process. What are opportunities are any questions we need to clarify as we’re forming a planner strategy?

Ellen (10:31):

So it’s fun. That’s so great. Because then you’re getting a lot of feedback when you’re making a decision, then you have people who are right there saying, okay, but here’s what could happen if we do that or here’s, you know, here’s, what’s good. That could happen. Here’s what we need to watch out for. Yes. In healthcare. That was something I wasn’t getting, whereas a lot of input from other people. So it’s so fun to, <laugh> be able to work with teams. I don’t have to do everything like, and that’s the thing I’ve only been in my role for about two months now, so wow. 

Alex: 

I really leverage everyone else’s knowledge. Yeah. Yeah. That is so funny that as you’re saying this, I’m thinking about all the people who have ever said, you know, well tech is all for introverts, just all alone. You never collaborate.

Ellen (11:17):

I mean, it’s never been my experience at all. So maybe you can speak a little bit more yeah. To wild the team and you know, working with a team. Do you yeah. What else would tell us about your team? 

Alex: 

Yeah. So again, like my role is really unique in that I’m not on necessarily a traditional team. Yeah. I work with multiple teams yeah. Across multiple teams. So essentially the way it works is like I somewhat report to more of like our director of digital products. Okay. And I’m helping take vision from our director of digital strategy. So he’s like our, our leadership. Yeah. And in taking that two across the digital product teams. Right. So it was a little difficult at first because I’m coming in new and I don’t have a specific team that I’m working with. Right. But luckily everyone at my, my client is very helpful and I just jumped into like asking for one-on-one meetings with multiple people and they helped me get to know things.

Ellen (12:17):

So now I get to be part of multiple teams, you know, our specifically like our website team, our app team. But I even get to branch in my role all the way across to like recently marketing and like our insights in research and even getting more into the specific engineering teams and data. So it’s really fun. You know, as you’re saying, like, this is a very collaborative role, I get to work with a lot of people. So even though I’m not in healthcare is like specifically client facing as an introvert that likes people. It’s really nice to form relationships and be able to rely on the people around me. 

Ellen: 

Right. Right. Everyone’s got, has their different pieces and they can, right. It’s not all on you doing every single. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Love it. And you just to clarify, you work remotely.

Alex:
Yeah. 

Ellen: 

So you’re doing all this collaborating over whom and over Miro boards and that’s why you’re socializing 

Alex: 

Yeah.

Ellen (13:14):

Yes. And that, you know, that does take a second to get used to, but the Miro boards, like all the different tools that are out there, make it a lot easier to collaborate remotely.

Alex: 

 I do, I am local to my company, so I did get to go in oh, fun in one day. Yeah. That was really nice. There’s just like a different level of connection when you’re in person, but I still love the flexibility of being remote it’s yeah.

Ellen:
It’s so hard. I definitely feel like remote work has been great for me to be flexible and like not do the commute. I did the commute for so long that I don’t miss that, but there is something to be said for being in person and with someone. And I think I definitely miss that piece of it. So I think it’s great that you got to meet your client and it’s working for you with the flexibility to be remote and that, you know, for sure being pregnant, if you’re yes.

Ellen (14:09):

You know, need to yeah. Even spitting a hundred times. <laugh>

Alex:
Yeah, that’s true. Like I don’t have to, again, like back to healthcare, like I had to like time out my bathroom breaks and that kind of stuff. And like, it’s just, it’s so much more flexible. I, I can go to the bathroom when I need to.

Ellen:
Right. Well, I was a teacher, so I would say, well, you have to go to the bathroom, the bell. Yeah. There’s the bell right now. You may go. You. Yeah, love it. I love it too funny. Okay. So I would love to know what your greatest struggle when learning tech slash attempting to break in and like, what was your greatest struggle? And then coming from a background of biomedical engineering was becoming a tech founder ever on your radar. And we’re gonna talk a little bit about company that you’ve founded in addition to this.

Ellen (14:55):

Oh my gosh. Pregnant, freelancing, starting company. She’s amazing. I know. 

Alex: 

Yeah. It’s been a long time coming. I will say, like, I always liked this quote of don’t compare your beginning to someone else’s middle or ends. Like I feel like I did kind of, my journey really probably started in high school. You know, I loved physics and did end up starting out in engineering. But I think my challenge was actually just my mindset, limiting beliefs. And I remember, you know, I know Ellen and you and I have talked about this, but Hey, don’t think I gave engineering a chance when I was in college. You know, I did have like a small experience of kind of questioning my abilities, like being a female in engineering. And honestly I think that reflecting now, I think it reflected on me and my own insecurities. And I did kind of mean to grow a little bit and I’ve gotten there eventually.

Alex (15:53):

It just took me like, I don’t know, that might have been 10 years ago. You’re still young. It’s all a journey. Like it’s all a journey. I’m like what? And you know, and you’ve like said this kind of stuff to me before, but you have more time than you think you don’t have to do it all in, you know, a week. So, so yeah, the biggest challenge was just overcoming those limiting beliefs. That’s why working with you for me was so important because maybe it’s your voice in my head, but like you can figure out anything, you can learn it like you can, but you have to be in the mindset to allow yourself to learn, to allow yourself to be a beginner. Right. In some sense. And that can be hard for some people, myself included. So that’s so important.

Ellen:
I love what you’re saying that because it really is at the heart of You are techY.

Ellen (16:39):

So Tony Robbins has this story. He tells he’s like, listen, you guys, when your kids to go get the salt and they don’t wanna do it. And then they go into the cabinet and they’re like, I don’t know where the salt is. I don’t know where the salt is. And then they can’t find the salt. And then you walk over and you go, there’s the salt it’s right there. And it’s so funny because yeah, he tells that I think in terms of tech and I’m like, oh my gosh, that’s the, that is totally your tagging. Because if you go in and you’re like, I don’t know if I can do it. I can’t do this. It’s too hard. How ever gonna be able to do it? You go in with that mindset. Of course you’re gonna fail, but doesn’t have anything new. It’s your intelligence or your are your capabilities.

Ellen (17:12):

You have to go in with the like L else. And I think that oftentimes when women we’re so hard on ourselves, that’s the black key that we’re putting up. It’s like, well, I should have figured it out the first time. No, actually you just keep trying. And so I think that is a really important point that if you don’t have that mindset and you don’t remind yourself, no, we’re gonna try something else. We’re gonna try something else. That’s probably why you’re not being successful in tech or why you’re not thinking yeah. About yourself in that successful way. 

Alex:
So that was a great, that’s a great point. I think I was kind of cycling there for years. So this step is being willing to make that change first. Not even just 10 years. Yes. Everything. 

Ellen: 

That’s so good. You said you totally overlooked computer science, even though you liked it.

Ellen (17:58):

And I find that so funny. Did you take programming classes? 

Alex: 

Yeah. I took programming classes in school. I liked it. I even created a video game. It was really fun. I enjoyed it. I think, you know, looking back, I think I thought that healthcare is where I should be. Healthcare is a great way to help people. So like I was such a fixed mindset of this is how I provide value to the world that I didn’t explore even like, what does Alex enjoy? What do I want to do? If you’re like, no, it didn’t even occur to me. I should do something. I like, wait a minute. Yeah, for sure. I just kept, you know, I saw like the boys around me and I was like, oh, you know, there’s so much more advancement in healthcare. That’ll be my thing, but that’s not true if I explored it.

Ellen (18:44):

Like, it could be my thing too. Right now. It’s your thing. I love it. That’s so good. Okay. Tell us about Vibrant PT and Wellness and how the heck you have time to do that while mommy and being pregnant and then like, who is the audience for? Who are you helping and what can you do for them?

Alex: 

Yeah. So to give a little context when I was a physical therapist, you know, my first decisions were to kind of figure out that I didn’t love the settings I was in. Is there something else I can do in healthcare? So that’s when I started creating Vibrant Physical Therapy and Wellness and seeing clients on my own, but this was actually during the pandemic as well. So it was figuring out how to support specifically moms from, from a more digital perspective, cuz we were all shifting to digital at that time.

Alex:  (19:36):

And it really allowed me to get to know my clients a little bit better even before they were working with me and come up with just creative solutions that were outside of traditional healthcare. So that was kind of my segue into tech. But in terms of how did I find time for that? Well, sometimes I would say, you know, Ellen, you and I have talked about this and I think we function similarly. Sometimes I almost like over function. So like I think in a way at times I was compensating and you know, using my business as an outlet during the pandemic. So it was a unique time for me, certainly. But as I continued practicing, like how do I, how do I fit this business in? Even today, it’s come down to things prioritizing for me, like working part-time for my clients so that I still have time to be a mom and to work on my business as well.

Alex (20:38):

But I will also say that one of the biggest shifts for me was hearing a podcast from you. And I can’t remember the exact name of the podcast, but the concept from it is doing like a weekly touchpoint with your partner. Yeah. So, and it was episode 71. I did look up the episode. Okay. In that episode, you Ellen were like on with your husband and you were talking about how you guys basically review your week and like touch base about points in life. So yeah, so really that helped me just start to allow my husband to take on more active roles in things that gave me more time to work on the things that I wanted to or needed to. Yep. So wanting to is okay. And just asking like when I needed support, I could do that ahead of time instead of like yeah.

Ellen (21:33):

Half the time, which took work for us at least. Yeah. I’m familiar with that one. It’s  youaretechy.com/71. And the title is A Look Inside My Worklife Reality with Kevin and Gwen to me cuz I’m holding the baby, which she’s trying at the time and yes <laugh> I do wanna get fit. Got it. Yeah, it is perfect. So I do want to, and there’s a YouTube video on it. We like set up a camera and everything and it’s pretty funny because I figured like my students are probably like exactly who, who signed done for life for you lady that you’re doing all these crazy things. So you get to meet Kevin and actually let me give credit because what we are doing is from Kevin’s work sort of. So he works for Patrick Lencioni of Five Dysfunctions of a Team, although he’s written many best sellers.

Ellen (22:23):

And my favorite is Three Questions for the Frantic Family. So if you go to tablegroup.com/product/frantic and I’ll link to it in the show notes, and then you click download, you have to scroll out a little bit and click download. You can actually use, you may not even be doing this, but you can use this template, which is like, what’s our railing cry. And then what are the steps that we’re doing to get there? And then what are the other steps that we have to keep doing just to maintain some kind of sanity in our life, in our family. And so Kevin and I do this, in fact, we did it last night. We normally do it on Sunday night, but we just moved and we’re trying to get everything situated. So we’re whatever we did it so yeah. And we were so proud cuz we had already written our new rallying cry before we moved.

Ellen (23:05):

I like what we wrote. Yeah. But the thing that’s so important is like, when you feel like everything around you is just chaotic, which we do right now. Cause we’re in boxes. Yeah. You can use this to center you and say, here’s what we’re working on right now. We don’t need to do everything. We don’t need to be perfect. We don’t need to do all the things, but here’s what we’re working on. So I just wanted to say that for people who wanna use it, but I love what you said that you can ask for help ahead of time. Don’t know if this is true for all of you listening, but it is true for Alex. It is definitely true for me that we feel like we have to take on all this stuff and then we’re like, oh my gosh, but I need help.

Ellen (23:39):

Why aren’t you helping me? I need all the help. Yeah. Instead of thinking through, okay, when do we really need help? And so, so, and in what ways, so that is so great. So what’s one thing that your husband’s doing now that he wasn’t doing before you were doing your weekly touchpoint. 

Alex: 

Yeah. Good question. So like honestly around the time we started doing the weekly touchpoints and I joined your program, we decided to put my daughter in full time childcare. So prior to us putting her in that care, like I was primarily taking care of her, still working part-time and it was mostly me, but now, you know, we pretty much like split that half in half. And we, even if I have a late meeting in the evening, like we’ll talk about that ahead of time and we’ll switch it. So he just, honestly, it’s more of me letting go and like realizing that he can get her ready in the morning.

Alex (24:35):

And yeah, even though I might do her hair or do things a certain way, it is okay that he gets her ready and she goes to school with fun hair in the morning. 

Ellen: 

Yeah fun hair. Don’t you guys love this? Yes. Okay. So that I’ll be straight forward. I have not let go of the hair yet because I’m not a good one, but that’s the one thing I do like I did. So Kevin took the baby to a lacrosse tournament and one of these moms was texting me. I’m like, we’re counting on you to do the hair, please. Can you help with the hair? <laugh> like, holy. Yeah. But I love that. You let that go. I love that. You let that go. I have let go of nightly dinner. He does most of the cooking. Ah, yes, honestly. And that is so helpful too.

Alex (25:19):

My husband has started doing more of that as well. He’s big on grilling and that kind of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. But, but that’s, and I think that’s the thing too Ellen, is that it’s okay to have some stuff you don’t let go of. Right. Other stuff that you’re okay with, you just can’t keep it all and do it all right. Right. There has to be some compromise. 

Ellen: 

But I think that it’s great that you did that because when my kids, when I first started having my kids, I felt like it was my job. I’m the mom. Yeah. To do that. I have to do everything. If I don’t do everything, then I’m not a good mom. And that, for those of you who are just starting out, that’s not true at all. Not, but it’s like, I don’t even know. And I feel like I had these from like growing up and my, my, and yet my mom is like, my mom never told me to do those.

Ellen (26:03):

She never, I know it’s like MIS minute, where did that come from? And then they love it. They love to be involved with the kids and to do, you know, they’re just as capable doing a preschool drop off. Maybe not here, but preschool drop off. Yeah. 

Alex: 

Yeah. True. Yeah. There are some, you know, strengths and weaknesses to each person’s abilities, but yes, they are so capable.

Ellen: 

I get totally off topic because I loved what you’re talking about. Sorry. It’s so much fun for me. I love the rally cry. Okay. So the audience, survivor and PT, those are a lot right. Specifically. 

Alex: 

Yeah. So I, you know, I think that’s part of why I connected with you so much because moms are so important to me, me as well. But the reason that I went into helping moms is that in my own personal experience, like I did have struggles some in pregnancy, but more so postpartum and just seeing, not only for my personal experiences, but professional experience and just seeing my clients and performing even user research now, as on the UX side and just hearing about the lack of support that women feel, that really is a topic that I enjoy encouraging women on supporting women on.

Alex (27:21):

There are some things that moms deal with that we don’t exactly like fix. But I think that there are things we can do to make things easier just as we’re talking about it on this podcast. 

Ellen: 

Right. So, right. Yeah. So I actually have a personal experience that I would like to share with you. I don’t think I’ve ever shared. Yeah. So I know it’s very hard for people to believe cuz I have had children, but I had, we had a lot of trouble getting pregnant initially and then I had a miscarriage early on. Yeah. But we had just moved insert joke, cuz we moved so much, but I did not have a gynecologist. I did not have an OB. And I called and I was like, I, you know, I just said a miscarriage and, and they were like, well there’s really nothing we can do at this point.

Alex (28:00):

Wow. 

Ellen:
Yeah. That was the response that I got and that crushed me like emotionally. I was like, and Kevin wasn’t even living with me at the time. Like he was still transitioning to our new home, and so when I look now I can look back and be like, oh my gosh, girl, you needed way more support than that. Yes. But at the time I was like, okay, I guess there’s nothing to do. So that’s from an emotional standpoint. Yeah. So I don’t know how much in your company is emotional support versus physical support, but it probably all comes together. I would think.

Alex:
Yeah, it definitely does. And I just wanna, you know, circle back to what you were saying, like I’m sorry that you went through that and that stories like those are why like to hold space for women because I, I still feel like there’s so much that we could do in those time periods.

Ellen (28:51):

Even if they feel like from the medical side, like you said, like the emotional support alone of like, okay, what you’re going through is this is typical for what we’re seeing. This is what you can expect. That’s valuable still just to have someone there along with you. 

 

Alex:
So right. You were asking Ellen, I think if there’s like emotional support to yeah. Yeah. I do as well. So as a physical therapist, my background is more on physical recovery, but like you said, it all mixes together. So yeah. Our physical recovery affects our mental recovery. Our mental recovery affects our physical recovery. So I certainly do cover topics like that, but I don’t cross into, you know, being a mental health provider. Mental health is very important to me personally. So I have a ton of resources, good going through, you know, especially going through grief myself.

Alex:  (29:46):

Right. But also, you know, you don’t, it doesn’t have to necessarily be grieving. It can just be like adjusting to motherhood. You know, all, this is a very common time for women to start to realize that maybe some of their coping behaviors that worked before kids aren’t necessarily working now. Yeah. Do you even need necessarily like a mental health diagnosis in order to benefit from, you know, working with a provider sometimes along with, you know, some support on the physical recovery side. 

Ellen:
Right. So I think that is such important work. And I’m gonna add this too, since I’m all out. So I suffered from postpartum with two of my five and one was with Gwen. And so, you know, one of the things too, when, well, like, wow, she’s got five, so she’s totally, it’s easy for her. And I, I that’s the gratitude that I’ll come up here.

Ellen (30:40):

And the thing is like you don’t, every child, every experience is different. And how you recover from that is different. You know, people always say, oh, it gets easier. It gets, you know, it’s better. Like the second one’s easier. That has never been true for me. My second delivery was awful. And so I think it’s important to just when you’re talking about these things, what I hear you saying is, you know, taking care of yourself each and every time, like you were saying pregnancy and postpartum and all the spaces really important in all the ways in all the ways that we need to take care of ourself. Cuz I had some physical challenges after Gwen in having recovering physically I know helped me with some of my postpartum. Really it didn’t solve it. It’s not a solving thing. Right. Physically getting stronger was helpful in that recovery.

Ellen (31:31):

So I think it really does go hand in hand. So I love that you offer resources and that you’ve used mental health professionals a lot. So you have a lot of resources to go to and you know, how supportive they can for the work that you’re doing and for mental health professionals, cuz it’s very needed. Yeah. 

Alex: 

Yeah. Thank you. And honestly, like part of me working with you is because you do value the, what I’ll phrase more is like mental wellness, but yes, I it’s something that is in every part of our life. And if you’re wanting to make a change, it really starts with, with mental so or emotional both. 

Ellen: 

And I love it. I love it. Okay. And so we kind of flipping back to tech a little bit, but sticking to the mom thing. Yeah. How do you view your role as a mom in tech?

Alex (32:19):

Yeah. So as a mom in tech, I don’t know why this is like a hard question for me to wrap my head around. Yeah. But I guess like how do I approach my role as a mom in tech? Like I think my daughter’s now three, so I’ve had some time to kind of figure out how to work and be a mom, but having boundaries doing like less people pleasing, which is, you know, that is something that was very natural to me was always people pleasing, shifting my mindset in terms of now that I’m in tech, like honestly I can have more boundaries. I don’t have to overperform I can still be a mom in ways that I was really struggling when I was in healthcare for my own personal reasons. But also sometimes the way the system is set up, that’s kind of how I approach my role as a mom.

Alex (33:13):

But I’ll also say that at my client in really I’ve seen in tech in general, it is surprisingly more supportive of moms and families than I’ve ever thought. I know you do talk about this a lot, but like if you’re not experiencing that support in tech, there might be another company <laugh> 

Ellen:
right, right. Good point. I love it. I love it. Great point. All right. So what advice do you have for a mom or a woman who’s thinking about breaking into tech and maybe she’s not sure if she ever really fit in or it feels awkward. She never thought about it or she thinks she’ll be judged because the people around her don’t see her as that. What advice do you have for her? 

Alex:
Just start doing it, you know, start going for it. If you even have an inkling that what you’re doing now, isn’t exactly what you want to do.

Alex (34:04):

And you think, okay, like tech might be the next step. Like I would just start taking those next steps. It’s okay to have, you know, some of those, what I’ll refer to as like more limiting beliefs, you can still keep taking steps and not be sure if it’s the right thing. Because at the end of the day, to me, the important thing is that you’re exploring what lights your fire. Yeah. What fits in your life and not necessarily like, yes, tech is still could still be the end goal, but it’s better to have explored that and say like, oh actually like tech, wasn’t exactly what I thought. Then two have never tried it at all. I think it will help you grow as a person in general. But I will also say that tech is such a big industry. That there’s a lot to explore.

Alex (34:55):

So even if you go in thinking I wanna be a UX designer and you end up more in product management, like that is perfectly fine as well. And honestly, that’s a little bit of what’s happened with me. Yes. I still do design stuff, but I do a lot more, I guess, product management type work than I initially thought I would and I’m enjoying it, so.

Ellen (35:15):

Right, right. That is awesome. Yeah. All right. Alex, tell people where they can find you.

Alex (35:21):

Yeah. Great question. Thanks for offering me this opportunity to connect with everyone. You can connect with me on LinkedIn. Like I’m happy to connect with anyone from You are techY, but the best place to find me, If you’re just looking for social media, I am on Instagram. My handle is @alexrcourtsdpt Alex R Courts as in like basketball courts, D P T. So that’s probably the best place to kind of keep up with me I guess, but my newest adventure in women’s health is postpartumrecoverytimeline.com. So definitely check me out. I’d love to connect.

Ellen (36:02):

Alex, thank you so much for being on the podcast today.

Alex (36:06):

Thanks for having me Ellen. It was fun.

Ellen (36:09):

Hey, if you enjoyed listening to this podcast, you have to sign up for the UR techie email list. Imagine being in the tech job of your dreams, join me to get the strategies training, and never ending support to get hired. Sign up at youaretechy.com. That’s Y O U A R E T E C H Y.com. I’ll see you next time.

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