Not your usual exam results celebration

[toomanycatsonthebed]

I think some of you here will understand. This is not the usual pride and joy post that you put on Facebook and not something I can say to anyone else in real life. I just stood in the shower and cried because she has got grades just good enough, to get her into Uni. I don't care whether she goes or not, but I know she has the choice now.

My daughter got her A level results today. Or rather, I got them online for her because she couldn't bear to look. Two years of stressed-out, acting-up, grumpy and sometimes downright angry and grim teenage daughter. Also two years of pleading with tutors to understand her anxiety about exams. But also an arsy, difficult teenager too. This was me negotiating tutors to keep her on the course when she had bunked off 50%, driving her to her exams when "the college bus didn't come", crying with frustration when she disappeared to her boyfriend's house the night before her exams and hadn't done any revision for weeks...Not the model child, not the model mother, but she has a choice now, and I can't tell anyone what it took to get those 3 bloody grades that look pretty poor.

She has an open door now and in a few years time, the actual grades won't matter. Xx

Congratulations to you both - her for the achievement & you for hanging in there & facilitating her success. We have to wait until 9am...

I understand. You live through the A level years with them, and you will be feeling some relief now. It sounds like she had a tough time (my own dd did too) and she's done well in spite of all the difficulties. Give yourself a pat on the back and treat yourself to something today.

Good morning too many, I am so pleased to hear that your daughter got grades that will give her the option of university, even if she decides it isn't for her right now.

I was in a similar position not so long ago myself, I was the one struggling with college. I spent the first year with an awful depression (it was my first experience of it) which led me to regularly pretending I had gone to college, waiting for my parents to leave for work then sneaking back into the house and laying in bed all day. My tutors were constantly ringing up with concerns and my parents didn't have a clue what to do with me. They didn't know I had depression but could tell something was wrong.

It was a horrendous time for me but I made it through and came out of it really well in the end. I'm a completely different person now but I am so grateful for that experience as horrible as it was.

I really hope your daughter can look back on that experience one day too and feel the same. I hope she gets to use her A level results and finds a university where she is happy

Thats absolutely wonderful

Like pp said, in a few years time the grades will be irrelevant. What matters now is that choices. Well done to your dd and you

Is that she has choices, that should read.

Great post

Ahh, thank you all. I knew you lot would understand, and it is very touching to read about it from the other point of view, Professor Pickles. xxxx

I should add, I had two years out after college and I'm starting my final year of university this September and I've loved every minute of it

I wish both you and her the very best!

I could have written your post word for word toomany - even the bit where I hid in the shower and sobbed with joy and relief that my DD has got in to uni. For some 3 D grades this morning would have been devastating, for us it was like a golden ticket! Hope things continue on the up for you and your DD. I'm sure I'll be back on here soon posting about whether or not she actually copes with uni, but today is a happy day!

I do feel for you toomany. I've just had the shittiest year with my own dd doing AS levels. I've nagged her about not doing any work and thinking that its OK to turn up late for class every day. She has put all her efforts into having a good time with her friends/bf. And today she can't even be bothered to go in and collect her results so I don't even know if she's failed or not.
So I am sat here crying tears of frustration and don't know if I can take another year of the same.
Sorry for the rant. Hope you are feeling a bit better.

Hi Moet and Peebles - it is bloody tough and at times it took me into depression and stress. But I would say now that I am glad I didn't give up on her. No matter how angry, depressed and stressed she made me (or maybe more fair to say, how angry and stressed I made myself). I think she realises what it took to stick by her and plead with tutors and keep her goingwhen she wanted to bail because she thought she was a failure or couldn't be bothered.

I think we all deserve to celebrate our D grades :-) xx

We bloody do!! Totally agree with your line about being so glad you didn't give up on her. Of course you never give up on them, but there were times when I thought of just totally leaving her to it. Sometimes I did, but it never lasted long.

Well done for supporting her through it all and getting her to this happy point.

You must be so relieved. It is all about choices isn't it.

Hopefully everything goes well for her.

I hope she will find Uni lovely and so will you. Be proud!

these are the real triumphs of parenting. It's easy when everything is going right to pat yourself on the back but to come out of truly horrendous and challenging times, sticking through it with them and supporting them even though they make it so much harder than it needs to be makes you a hero.

You're a great mum.

Well done toomanycats. I'm sure your post will strike a chord with a lot of mn-etters.

My lovely friend gave me a bunch of flowers when my DS got into a specialist school. In recognition of all the chivvying, hard-thinking and running around I did.

I totally get that huge feeling of relief. Bliss.

Well done again. Have some from me.

I've done my share of pleading with teachers too..... shudder

Those days are behind you. Woohoo. Well done again

Oh I remember well that feeling of absolutely frustration with my son - he was lovely but so laid back. If he needed 50% to pass, he considered 51% to have involved a wasted effort.

He got to university (foundation year) and luckily in his first week he met students who were there to work (it was a vocational subject.) He worked non-stop for the four years and got a First.

I'm so proud of him - not for the First, so much, but for actually working hard. It was an amazing transformation and he did it without my boot up his bum. And I know I still think, "Why couldn't you have bloody well done that in the first place?" but really, it's far better to learn it yourself than have someone tell you again and again.

Well that's a relief to know you can get into university with 3 D grades.
My daughters smug high performing girls grammar just bangs on and on about how many girls got A's and B's without a thought for those girls

( and their parents) who scraped through with C's, D'sand E's.....

Yes don't despair timetogetup. Obviously my DD isn't going to a RG uni, but the course was advertised as needing BCC, her offer was CDD, and they accepted her with DDD. So shop around, if that's what your DD wants to do.

Congratulations, OP!!! Well done!!! We have had our troubles and I can well imagine what those grades have cost you- and her too!

Waiting to hear on Thursday if ds has managed to get the GCSEs to get into Sixth Form college.

In the meantime, dd is applying to drama school for the third time. But she has not given up and she is supporting herself while waiting- I am more proud of her for that than I could ever have been if she had sailed into Oxbridge.