We Had Cake. Because He Showed Up.

He didn’t know I was proud before the results. So I made sure he did.

This one is for all the kids sitting their GCSEs this week.

Every single one of them.

The pressure on young people now is enormous. Exams, expectations, social media, anxiety, mental health, comparison, pressure from every angle. It is not the same world many of us grew up in, and even then, it was hard enough.

My eldest started his GCSEs this year. After his first three exams, I brought him home a cake.

Because he sat them. That alone matters.

He has struggled with academia his whole life. He has complex neurodevelopmental needs and has had an incredibly difficult 18 months with his mental health. He did not get the support he needed for years because he was not disruptive. He was not “naughty”, so his struggles were easier to miss.

That invisibility is its own kind of harm. And it is far more common than people realise.

Right now, one in five children in the UK has a probable mental health problem — more than double the rate recorded in 2017. Half of all mental health conditions first emerge by the age of 14. By the time a child reaches their GCSE years, many are already fighting battles that no exam board will ever measure or acknowledge. Nearly a third of 11 to 16 year olds with a mental health condition missed at least a week of school in 2023. Across the UK, over a quarter of children waiting for community mental health support are waiting the equivalent of an entire school term before anyone begins to help them. Here in Wales, around one in three children is waiting longer than a month to begin therapy even after completing their initial assessment.

My son is one of those numbers. Or he would have been, if anyone had been counting.

The system that was supposed to catch them, didn’t. And they sat their exams anyway.

There were people — adults, professionals — who questioned whether he would ever go back to school at all.

He went back. He kept going. And this week, he sat his exams.

This cake has nothing to do with results. It has everything to do with strength. The kind of strength that most people will never see, because it doesn’t look like winning. It looks like getting up when everything in you wants to stay down. It looks like walking through a door that nearly broke you, and walking through it anyway.

But I want to say something else, because this post is for every child — not only the ones the world can see are struggling.

If your child is predicted top grades, if they appear to be coping, if teachers say they are doing brilliantly — please do not assume they are fine. The pressure on high-achieving young people is immense in its own way. The weight of expectation, the fear of falling short of what everyone has decided they are capable of, the anxiety that one bad paper will undo everything — these are real. Perfectionism is not a personality trait to be admired in a teenager. It is often a sign that a young person does not feel safe enough to fail.

Some of the most overwhelmed children sitting these exams this week will not look overwhelmed. They will hand in every paper. They will not miss a single day. And inside, they will be exhausted in ways nobody is thinking to ask about.

The child who is struggling visibly needs your support. So does the child who isn’t.

But I am proud of him.

Not because of a grade on a piece of paper. Not because of what results day might bring. I am proud because he turned up, tried, and kept going.

If he fails them all, I will still be proud of him. We will work out the next step together. His wellbeing, safety and happiness matter more than any exam result ever could.

School is not the right environment for every child. Some children shine academically. Some shine elsewhere. Some are capable of extraordinary things that will never be measured sitting behind a desk.

The child who cannot sit still in a classroom might be the one who builds something the world has never seen. The one who fails English might write something one day that changes someone’s life. Grades measure one narrow thing, on one particular day, under enormous pressure. They are not a verdict.

So to every child sitting exams right now — the ones who are struggling, the ones who look like they are flying, and everyone in between: turning up counts. Trying counts. Surviving this season counts.

And to every parent watching — the stress, the changes, the anxiety, the silence, the pressure: sometimes they need to know we are proud of them before we know the outcome.