OUR WHOLE LIVES are dominated by it. There are revision timetables stuck up on the fridge door, in the dining room, over his bed; if you try to get into the sitting room, you fall over bits of his art project; the drawings for his woodwork project are spread all over the spare bedroom.

Juniorcertitis has hit our household with a vengeance. Christmas was dominated by exhortations to get down to revision and deep pangs of guilt when we somehow never managed to achieve this.

We couldn't go away at the Patrick's weekend because the mocks were coming up; we stayed at home over Easter because the mock results indicated it was now or never.

And we'll probably be spending the June bank holiday knee deep in Irish dictionaries and maths tables.

I read articles about exam stress in the papers and I laugh hysterically. Stress? He doesn't know the meaning of the word.

I'm the one's who's drawing up all these timetables. "Now, let's see, it's two hours' history tonight."

"No, I think I'm going to work on my woodwork project again."

"But you've done no history for two weeks now - and you haven't even started geography yet."

The revision timetables get endlessly re written and re negotiated. "What about science?" I wail.

"Just relax Mum, I'll be fine" - and he's off to watch The X Files.

I've become compulsively suspicious. I creep up to his bedroom door to listen when he's supposedly studying with his friend. Are they chatting? Is the CD on? I ring up from work: "What subject was it you're working on today?"

When his friends call, I pounce: "How many hours' revision are you doing?"

"Just relax Mum, I'll be fine" - and he's off to watch The X Files.

I've become compulsively suspicious. I creep up to his bedroom door to listen when he's supposedly studying with his friend. Are they chatting? Is the CD on? I ring up from work: "What subject was it you're working on today?"

When his friends call, I pounce: "How many hours' revision are you doing?"

"Five," said James, catapulting me into an instant panic.

"The girls," confided another exam afflicted parent, "Mr O'Brien says they're all doing six hours a night." Oh, to be the mother of a girl.

I become paranoid if I haven't seen a friend around for a few days. I'm convinced they're all holed up at home secretly studying round the clock.

I engage in serious bouts of self blame. If only I had been stricter earlier on, if only I had instilled proper study habits.

Why do I keep losing my temper? Am I a failure as a parent?

At Easter half the class trotted off to the Institute. He's better off revising at home, I told myself smugly. But as the days passed and the hours of revision failed to mount up, I began to see some sense in this Institute business after all. My God, had I put him at a disadvantage?

At times I feel as if I am sitting the exam myself. "Imagine the ignominy if we failed English," I found myself saying to my husband recently.

"You're suffering from exam nerves," he retorted.

As we wrangle one more time over whether he should be expected to revise on Sundays as well as Saturdays, I try to keep my mind focused on that sunny day - it's bound to be sunny - at the end of June when it'll all be over and I'll be a free woman again.