Thread 44 GCSE Covid Cohort - Countdown to Christmas & New Year

[OrangeCinnamonLatte]

This is a support thread for our young adults post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting, and their results ( or life updates for those who went into work or have had results earlier). It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, uni vs employment please don't within this thread.

Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue. We were previously on the secondary board and then further education, now we shall be here in 'Parents of Adult Children' gulp

Our DS/DD may continue down various pathways ( employment, apprenticeships, higher ed). Be warned there might be lots of 'Uni Freshers' chat this time of year. My experience is that everyone is welcomed wherever, whatever their child is doing we have some in work, gap years , apprenticeships etc too. Lots of contributors with different experiences and always sympathy and advice to be had

It's taken me ages to find this thread! Forgot that it had been put in adult children !

Not the best of news for our charges (or us for those who top up living funds...)

www.theguardian.com/money/2023/jan/11/student-maintenance-loans-rise-england-next-year

This is especially stark alongside news that rents have risen 7% in the last year...

Good luck Craggy, how exciting, but nerve-racking. That would hack me off Zebra. Ds1 has been to London re possible Camp America. He asked tonight about going back on Saturday instead of planned Sunday. I am still so incredibly sad and can't get over how almost unpleasant and not involved he's been this Christmas and different it's all been, and how I didn't foresee this.

My school friend's 50th Cotswolds long weekend away, was lovely. I had 2 planned cocktails, and got reprimanded on my Dry January thread, which fucked me off massively. I've already planned to finish my DJ, which I always find easy, early, for my 50th girly birthday party on 28th.

Yay, found you lot again. Sorry, I completely dropped off the radar as life has been a bit tough recently starting with me having shingles in November and the most beastly "not covid cold" but which lasted ages so i've been very run down and which ended with my lovely mum passing away right at the beginning of January.
Good news is both DD and I applied and then got interviews for an invigilating job and we heard today we both got a position and start training tomorrow. She was convinced she wouldn't get it as only on a 1 year gap year but we are so excited to be working together. It works well around our other jobs too of which DD has 5 albeit p/t.

Been trying to catch up but this thread moves so fast.

Welcome to @17CherryTreeLane and congrats on the new job @craggyrat and yay for joining the WI - always quite fancied joining one myself.
Great news on the Uni offers @ZittiEBuoni for DD2, can't believe you're having to go through this again so soon.
I hear you all the GP surgery front. Got a text to say please do not contact the surgery unless absolutely necessary but try a pharmacy first which is what I would normally do. I feel lucky to have got my shingle meds last year as was seen on the same day after submitting pics.
Love the matchbox pic @PhotoDad

Thanks everyone re job congrats.

@AnneOfCleavage - very sorry to hear about your mother.

@craggyrat Great news about the new job!

@AnneOfCleavage My sympathies on the loss of your mum. What an awful few months you have had.

So sorry to hear that AofC.

@Oblomov22 Sounds a very judgy DJ thread. I hope you enjoyed a lovely weekend.
I read somewhere this first holiday at home is often difficult as DC want to exert their independence at a time most of us are thinking family first and making compromises for others for Christmas.

So sorry to hear about your mum @AnneOfCleavage

welcome to the thread @17CherryTreeLane

Eww, thanks, re ds and also DJ. I can't tell you how pissed off I was. As I said I do DJ easily, been on the threads for years. But this year I planned to a) finish early for my own 50th party, and b)Have a night off for my closest friends 50th. 2 x Pornstar Martini's. 🍹🍹On such threads people fail, some only cut down only a bit. I didn't expect such judgmental scorn. Really seriously pissed me off. They could take a leaf out of this lovely thread, where we all support eachother no matter what.

@Oblomov22 I find that very odd, what business is it of anyone else’s if you decided to have a couple of cocktails?!

Awww you guys. Thank you so very much for your kind messages. I'm actually feeling rather choked up. It truly means so much.

So sorry to hear about your mum @AnneOfCleavage , that’s really rough. I always think January and February are hard going anyway, being cold and dark and with all the bugs around, so when sad things happen too, it’s even harder.

Dd has been unwell in bed all week and I can’t work out what’s going on. She wakes up with a bad headache which subsides over the course of the day, but she also has tummy ache and says she feels sick and has an odd taste in her mouth. But she’s eating. She’s got exams next week so I hope she’s up to going back at the weekend.

So sorry @AnneOfCleavage on your sad news💐
Congratulations to all with new jobs.

I'm so sorry to hear about your mum @AnneOfCleavage

@Oblomov22 I had a similar experience on the low carb bootcamp threads a few years ago, really pissed me off too.

DS is home again, picked him up this afternoon, we had a lovely long chat in the car, his first driving lesson went well, phew.

So sorry for the loss of your mum @AnneOfCleavage

So sorry to hear about your mum @AnneOfCleavage - sounds like a hard end to the year/start of the new year. How are you managing?

and congrats on the new job @craggyrat : ex voting/scary times!

and boo the dry January judginess @Oblomov22 I’ve done dry Jan for a few years and was on the penguin threads way back but don’t really bother any more. Sometimes I break my own dry Jan rules, but it always works as a good reset.

Really sorry to hear the news of you losing your mum @AnneOfCleavage and the illnesses too - hoping that this new job with your daughter will be the start of a better few months!

@AnneOfCleavage So sorry you have had such a rotten time. My friend used to do invigilating , they used to smuggle in sudokus and set each other weird challenges. Sounded quite fun! I’m sure that none of it showed.

So tonight we’ve had a tearful stuttering mess explaining that she doesnt want to go back to Uni. She has had a hard time, and she has things she needs to process I think the trauma in the Autumn was so shattering she went into full flight mode and decided she hated everything. She wants to stay here and have professional help, but the funding for that is about to end. She feels she chose the wrong course. There is one she would prefer, and it may be possible to return to the other course in October.
I’ve been waiting for this. We wrote an action plan. She has to spend 24 hours thinking of the pros and cons. But we promised to support her whatever her decision. Gave her a lot of cons though, and made her listen and insisted that she understand it would not be easy.
She has to do all the admin, she has to pay us a proper rent, and sort a job or benefits. Told her that she will be here as an adult, we wont be giving her lifts and picking up her prescriptions . Laid down more rules than a 1950s seaside landlady. And told her she would have to clear off sometimes so that we got space.
My big worry is that without structure a mental health episode can become a way of life. There was a recent thread on MN about a girl who left Uni after a term and has essentially stayed in her room for 3 years, making her parents life a misery, refusing to follow any of the counsellors advice.I’m not having that. I told her that we are old and need a quiet life, if she can’t stick to the agreement she will have to leave. We didn’t sugar coat it because if she thinks she can regress from the big old nasty adult world, she’s in for a shock.

It all sounds harsh, but it’s not because she’s not our biological child, it’s because we’ve been through similar before and lessons were learned. I hope she gets that.
Almost made getting my prescription which has so far taken days and days, seem easy.

@EspeciallyDetermined I would not worry about extra time for Driving Theory - they have loads of time, I think mine both used less than half the available time and finished early. If he has been practicing with the DVLA app he will know how long he generally takes to do a batch of questions and can work out whether he might want extra time.

@PhotoDad we really need a "Like" button for your DD's artwork.

Sorry to hear about your mother, @AnneOfCleavage. And, @Zebracat, that doesn't sound at all easy for anyone. I hope that 2023 can provide fresh starts for anyone who needs one.

Gosh, I had not seen the final page of posts of troubles.

@AnneOfCleavage sorry to hear you have had such an awful time, hope things improve across the board from here. It is so lovely that your DD wants to work with you, my DSs would be horrified in the same situation, we are so embarrassing!

@Zebracat you sound so wise. I also know people with MH issues who have been indulged and ended up dragging them on and letting it be a way of life. I have no idea what the right answer is, but it sounds like you are being brave and pragmatic. Hope it is not too much influenced by the flatmate she fancied who ended up in a relationship with another flatmate. It seems like Liberal Arts courses really need to come with a health warning!

@Oblomov22 some people will be struggling to maintain DJ and it will make them grumpy.

So sorry to hear about your mother @AnneOfCleavage, I still miss mine so much after 5 years . Here for invigilation chat any time - just embarking on my second year of pacing the sports hall.

@Zebracat your words about mental health episodes becoming a way of life resonate here - it's what I'm fighting with dd all the time. Luckily she loves a timetable, so we have breakfast-reading/researching-lunch-sewing and crafts-dinner-free time here, while we wait for something (anything!) to break through her impenetrable wall of anxiety. It's hard to gauge when to exert a bit of benign pressure and when to accept she won't cope with it though. All best wishes to your dd and I hope she finds her way back on to her path soon.

@AnneOfCleavage 

@Zebracat it seems to be very common this year. DDs friend are split into two camps - can't wait to go back, or don't want to continue. I think Covid continues to play a big part in how it's affected mental health. At the end of the day, I think we can all agree that we just want our children to be happy.

@AnneOfCleavage 

@Zebracat it seems to be very common this year. DDs friend are split into two camps - can't wait to go back, or don't want to continue. I think Covid continues to play a big part in how it's affected mental health. At the end of the day, I think we can all agree that we just want our children to be happy.