Jane Reacher

Hi academicbirb and stothmonster! Good to see this thread here. I also feel good to see that other students with nontraditional backgrounds are going for it. I've become quite pessimistic about my chances, but I guess all I need is one school willing to take a chance. My overall GPA is average (3.4), but that's only because of failing to withdraw in time a couple of semesters (once from community college) when I had a great deal of family responsibility and a major death in the family. My last 2 years GPA is almost 4.0  from a well-regarded public university. I'm a social science major but with some public health coursework (i.e. introductory epidemiology). I've done qualitative health research for an honors thesis, and I've been published (but not for a health related topic). I'm also much older than the typical college student and I've worked almost full-time throughout my academic career. On the other hand, I take the GRE tomorrow and my Quantitative diagnostics are mediocre (155 average).
So what I see as the good:
Last two years GPA ~4.0
Strong recommendation letters
Strong personal statement with personal background marking me as atypical in a positive way
Undergraduate research experience/Honors thesis
GRE verbal score
Good grades (mostly As, one A-) in public health and math/stats courses
Dean's list for equivalent of 3 years (including last two)
Research scholarship recipient
 
Meh:
Recent non-public health publication
2-3 years spent abroad (though not doing health work), which influenced my career goals
Working for public health department (though admin work rather than research)
History of untreated mental health issues, which I will mention but not over-emphasize in my statement
Bad:
GRE quantitative score
GPA prior to last two years
Too many course withdrawals over academic career
Not enough math/science courses
 
academicbirb:
I don't have any sense about Harvard (they are also one my reach schools) as I don't know anyone who applied there. However, BU is also on my list and I do know someone who got in there who had much less experience than you do, no publications and a not nearly as strong GPA. His GREs were a bit higher than yours as he cracked 150 on the quantitative. He didn't get a great financial offer but my guess is that you will get into BU with a good financial package.
stothmonster: 
I also worry about experience given that I've had to work to support myself so I haven't been able to look for other types of experiences and, honestly, when I first looking for a job at the university, I didn't wait around for a research job and took the first one I got.
 
Looking at other sites, it seems somewhat unpredictable who gets in where. Obviously, perfect stats keep you in the running, but it also seems possible to overcome the less than perfect stats and less experience than other candidates. And, like I said, it just takes one school! Good luck to you both!