What this book is

What this book is. This book offers general educational information about everyday stress and study habits. It is not a substitute for individual medical or psychological advice.

Nothing in it is a diagnosis, a treatment or a plan for anybody in particular. It is written from one person's experience and practice, and it assumes a reader dealing with the ordinary pressure of school — the kind that comes and goes.

A note for readers outside the UK. The exams in this book are the English ones — GCSEs, mocks, grades from 9 down to 1, Year 10 and Year 11. If yours are called something else, the names will not match and nothing else changes: the pressure is the same shape everywhere, and so is everything this book asks you to do about it. Read "mock" as whatever your school calls the exam that doesn't count but feels like it does. If what you are carrying is heavier than that, or it has been there a long time, If You Need to Talk to Someone is a better place to start than chapter one.