Exam Stress and Anxiety

Exam season is officially upon us, whether it's GCSE's, AS, or A level exams there is a lot of stress which goes with them. I get panic attacks and anxiety, so have developed lots of ways to handle this especially around exams so I thought I would give you some of my tips and ideas specifically for exams, preparing for them and during them.
Originally I was going to do a list type post, but that didn't work out so I've taken more of a chatty approach. Obviously its a bit late for revision tips, so this isn't going to be anything about that more preparing for the actual exam and dealing with stress during the exam.
The first thing to remember is everyone is going to be stressed, even if its a tiny bit. No matter how much they say they aren't a little tiny bit of them will be, so don't let this panic you at all. There will be one person wandering around outside the exam hall exclaiming how little they have revised and how chilled they are about the whole situation. Also I know its hard but try to shut most people out while you are outside the exam hall waiting to go in, they will all be stressing and trying to panic revise before they go in. You don't want their stress to add to yours, prepare some notes of key ideas just to jog your memory before you go in. During the exam, you just have to go for it. Don't sit and worry just start logically working your way through. Taking each question at a time, while keeping an eye on the time. If you don any kind of essay subject timing is key, so make sure you know how long to spend on each question, take a couple of seconds to work out at the beginning exactly what time you should move onto each question, instead of having to try and work out how many minutes you've spent further on during the exam. Remember to check the paper through, read the questions fully and check the back of the page that you haven't missed anything out.
The majority of the stress will be before the exam and the night before, once you actually come to it normally I just tend to forget all the worry and get on with it because there is nothing else which I can do once I have got to that point.
The night before is normally when I get the most stressed, panic revising and staying up way too late. You need to decide a time when your going to stop revision for the evening, and then try as much as possible to switch off. Have a bath, watch some TV and drink tea is normally my approach to doing this. Go to bed early, but not too early. There is no point getting into bed at 8, and lying awake worrying just go to bed when your tired and don't sit and scroll through social media for a few hours. Wake up with plenty of time, avoid rushing and give yourself enough time to wake up before your exam. Eat breakfast and your good to go.

I hope this was helpful to any of you who have exams, I'm sure they will all go very well!
Good Luck

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