GCSEs 2018 (16) - The Final Countdown

[mmzz]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/secondary/3304925-gcses-2018-15-the-reckoning?

Since we are talking usernames.. Who is Bishop Brennan? I've been curious about that for ages!

Of Father Ted fame.

Oddsocks I agree with mmzz that it's very likely you are so good at current job that they don't want to move you. I would ask for the feedback interview - you can see it as sending a signal that you really wanted the promotion and you're keen to identify anything you can improve. If nothing else it forces the people making these dumb decisions to have to spend time thinking about it.
oneteen got the name change!
Bluebelle oh no, definitely not a good start!

Oddsocks also, hate to say this, but if you are going to find a new job, it will be easier if you do it before your age starts with a 5 ( as one of DH's friends is finding out).

I'm as Cornish as they come, hence the name, and I'm still me. Morning all.

Alex each no is one step closer to finding out what is wrong.

Kicking Bishop Brennan up the Arse is classic episode of Father Ted. I started to add the plot, but it doesn't sound remotely funny out of context.

Oddsocks sometimes people can't imagine you in another role if you have been in your current position for a while. Bringing it back to our DC, look at how many of them are keen to move on over the next few weeks so that they can reinvent themselves. However, moving on with another business is really tough, because you are leaving your comfort zone at the same time as you are reinventing yourself, when you actually need that security. I think I agree with the others that you should ask for a meeting to make sure people are aware that you are serious. Write down the key points and questions you have so nothing gets overlooked. Ask how the decision has been made, which criteria they used and what you need to do. Once you have an action plan from your current employer, consider whether it would be preferable to move on.

Just checking in to mark my place on the new thread. Sorry to hear about your work oddsocks. I am on your behalf that your DH hasn't noticed how you feel. I am married to someone who is also a bit rubbish at noticing these things and it can feel very hard, even though I know it's not because he doesn't care.

Just heard from DD1 that her summer school is "brilliant" which is a relief because she'd gone very quiet and I was a bit worried she was moping. Apparently she's been too busy to text. Sign of things to come, I suspect.

Bluebelle our bins were fairly rank when I put them out earlier as they have been fermenting for a couple of weeks. I feel your revulsion & don't even have furry friends.

oddsocks that sounds crappy. I once lost out on a job to someone who I have since given support to.

The workplace when you are 50ish reminded me of this book someone bought me for Christmas www.goodreads.com/book/show/34964851-how-hard-can-it-be it's by the author of "I don't know how she does it" and is an easy read, very recognisable and sometimes funny, sometimes poignant.

Oddsocks seconding what mmzz says. I have realised that I technically have 20 years until I retire. Some of my chums don't seem to have twigged this yet and still see themselves in school hours/ term time roles for the foreseeable future. In my mind I need to be in a position which I will find fulfilling for longer than my DD will ever have lived at home. Be brave and consider a move if you believe you have more to offer than your current employer is willing to give as opportunities.

Hi I'm here! Newish name only to confuse advance searchers

Very relieved to hear that Alexanders DH doesn't have stroke or brain condition, hope they can get to the bottom of it asap.

Got back from hol yesterday. Still alive despite 9 days with my mother. I know she's 80 and I need to be more forgiving but.... bloody hell she can be infuriating! And I feel like a naughty teenager when she gets annoyed. Anyway the kids had fun and the weather was nice and I managed to force in two beach BBQs rather than have to be taken out to awful local restaurant

oddsocks I feel your pain. I also feel very old today. I am going for my first job interview since 1996. I have been a SAHM for 15 years and decided I fancy working PT. I can't go back to what I used to do because it no longer exists so I'm hoping to use my meagre skills to get into something new. Am terrified!!! Put on weight this summer so have choice of one formal skirt to wear. And haven't told anyone in RL about interview (DH is away).

Peggy that was a 47th birthday present to myself. I did find the ending of her first one very annoying, as it reminded me of that annoying film in the 80s where the super-woman business person ended up spooning baby food into jars on a ranch somewhere when she had a baby dumped on her. I think the social media thing terrified me for months in her latest.

Am I right in thinking that the iGCSE results are due out on Tuesday?

I seem to remember that there are quite a few DC doing iGCSEs on this thread. Does it feel like it's getting awfully close yet? Are your DC focusing on it, yet?

Terf good luck!

Stickerrocks no not those furry friends its my friend's dog that we are looking after, he is proving to be a bit of a handful!!!

Terf well done for managing to find a skirt full stop. I have spent the last few weeks looking crumpled (how do people manage to make linen look effortless?) or a cliche of a middle aged, middle class mum in a selection of Joules stripey dresses, dependi g on who I'm teaching.

You can do this. Employers want reliable people they can get on with. Let your personality & common sense shine through.

DS hasn’t mentioned it in a while si I’m carefully not reminding him. I will probably start talking about it next week though so we re prepared.

Book lightweight not serious (she adds nervously in case you are all great literature fans).

Back to DC and work experience. I don't think it matters for many universities but for other roles it does. I sometimes interview undergraduates for internships and graduates for very competitive roles. They all have or are doing excellant degrees. The roles involve a lot of dealing with people (health). The only thing to distunguish them really is their work experience or volunteering.

Any work experience is helpful. Someone rightly said that in a day on customer services at B&Q she had to deal with all sorts. Someone else said they had no relevant work experience but I adked her to tell me about difficult situations she had dealt with working in the bar of a big sports stadium. She was a bit shy but I gave her a chance and she did really well.

I'm also more impressed by local, longer term volunteering than by a week doing travel volunteering abroad. I think you can learn loads from say, helping at a local Brownie pack, every week (team work, safeguarding, planning etc) and it shows you can be reliable.

Obviously the advice on work experience is a bit specific to health/public facing jobs. In other fields they would want to hear different things. For engineering they might want to hear about realted hobbies, when you solved a problem etc.

Before DS1 was born, I had a good City job, great wardrobe, nice house, several exotic holidays each year and a good social life. In my mind, I was only taking time out from that for maternity leave. I never thought I was giving up that life for good, just putting it on hold for a year it so.
However, I couldn't make the long hours and trips overseas work with being a mother to DS. So, one had to go and it wasn't going to be DS1!
I've turned my life upside down for my DC. I love them both unconditionally, and I've worked really hard to take care of them.
But they have little use for me any more. DS2, in particular, has developed a horror of being publicly seen in my company. In two years time, DS1 will leave home to go to university, and the chances are that he'll never come back to live with us again. So, I'd like my old life back. The problem is that it's not available.
DH wants me to throw myself into his new venture. I'm going to have to do it because we need the money and otherwise I'll have nothing to do. But I look in the mirror and I don't like what I see: getting old, frumpy, lacking self confidence and facing up to the fact that in a few short years the Two DC whom I've devoted myself to will be leaving for good and I'll need to force myself not to cling on to them.
Sorry to bring a downer onto the threads.

Dd did a couple of iGCSE's but the school is doling out results and is sticking to the one day of 23 August for all. Is there a way that we can access them ourselves somehow prior to that?

Very best of luck Terf, I hope that you get it. I haven't done any paid work for around the same period and have been mostly happy with this (have done another degree, volunteered etc and enjoyed not juggling work and family life) but now that I can see a time when the dc have flown the roost I am feeling unsettled and leaning towards a return to work - although not what I did 13 years ago.

Oddsocks - sorry to hear that you are feeling understandably flat. I agree with the advice on here to seek feedback on your interview process and to cast your net beyond your current employer. It sucks though!

mmzz - just read your last post. I think you speak for many parents - mums in particular - of teenage dc. We'll need this thread not just for sixth form life but for moral support to combat that (I hate the expression) 'empty nest' feeling that will come more to the fore over the next few years. I am dreading it and under no illusion about how difficult it is going to be, and am trying to plan for it

Oh gosh, I hope I haven't caused offence mmzz. The film implied that a mummy could only have a successful business doing mummy related things and b) my friends don't seem to have realised yet that their DC are moving on and it's time to start thinking about themselves a bit more. You have so many skills and you can envisage a future which doesn't just involve making models of Tudor houses and dropping off at swimming lessons.

DC whom I've devoted myself to will be leaving for good

It's different as ime they need you less often but more intermittently and sometimes less predictably. So phonecalls like "I've had a car crash/I feel really ill/there's a rat in the attic/the toilet is blocked" happen out of the blue.

2 of my older DC are moving this month. I have a secondhand IKEA wardrobe in bits in the garage for one. I will be driving one evening to other DC's lodgings to help clean room and drive their bike home.

You get the picture. Not redundant yet.

Thanks for the new thread mmzz.

I think I will be needing a name change too soon.

Glad to hear the news AlexanderHamilton Re your DH.

I totally understand and identify what you have all says about the great career before DC. I too did the same. I didn't stop working as needed to work to afford the private school fees but have definitely taken on lower roles, worked in unfulfilling roles for rubbish managers when I know I am capable of so much more - all because I didn't want to rock the boat and keep the work life balance that allowed me to be here for my DC. I want to make the most of the few years I have left with them under my roof - in 5 years I will Be an empty nester. But slowly I am starting to do things for me too so that I don't lose myself.

In terms of results it's the CIE board results that are out on Tuesday - we have been given log in details by the school to get them on a Tuesday or can get them on Thursday from school. Thursday is when the A level results are out too so I imagine schools will be open for this - may be worth asking if you have anybody who sat CIE igcses or Add Maths.