This was the case for Sandy Hristov, who, a couple of years ago had left a bad marriage, and had a teenage son who hated everything about school.

Sandy was told that her oldest son, Aidan, had ADHD, and probably wouldn't be getting any GCSEs, but wasn't bad enough to get a statement, which would have allowed him extra help.

She had walked out on her husband, and been left with nothing. Her life was at a very low point.

"When I got out of my marriage I was very low on self confidence, I was living in a friend's spare room, and I was being told that my son was going nowhere," she said.

"But I went along to the Peterborough Women's Centre – I wasn't an avid visitor, but it was good having somewhere to go, people to touch base with – and I slowly got my life together the way I wanted it to be. And as my life changed, my confidence grew. I don't know where it came from – it was probably sheer bloody mindedness."

Sandy's life is now radically different from how it once was.

She has built up her own mobile disco business, Sandy's Sounds, and pays for her son to attend a boarding school in Somerset, Brymore, which is a state school for boys who aren't reaching their full potential in mainstream schools.

It's a school of rural technology, and is attached to a farm, so boys can help rear animals, tend a walled Victorian vegetable garden, and learn practical life skills.

Teaching is free, but Sandy has to find living expenses of £2,000 a term to keep him there, which she does.

"I live very simply," she said. "I drive a battered van, I live in a rented room in shared house in Lincoln Road, and I worked hard to pay for my music equipment.

"His education will have cost me £20,000 by the time he's finished, but it's worth every penny. He's a changed boy.

"He loves going to school now, and this is a lad who used to hate school. He's very respectful and polite, and always thanks me for what I do for him.

"And his teachers think that he will get grade Cs in all of the eight GCSEs he is sitting, and he is staying on to Year 12, studying for an NVQ in engineering."

Sandy's life has changed much since she divorced, and when she mentions that the motto of her son's school is 'Respect, resourcefulness and resilience,' it's easy to think that that could be her motto as well.

Her story is one that will give hope to any single mum struggling to do her best by her kids at the same time as running her own life on her own terms.

"When I left my husband things looked very bleak for me," she said. "My parents told me to go and get a job wherever, just get a job. But I held out, and am making money from doing something that I enjoy, which everyone can do.

"There is a light at the end of the tunnel, you've just got to find it. And if one door closes, you have to kick it open."

Sandy has been nominated for the Mother of the Year category in the Women of Achievement awards.

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If you want to nominate someone for an award, nominate online now: www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/woa, or enter by post with Your name, phone number, address, the person you are nominating plus their contact details, and the reason you are nominating them (in no more than 400 words), to Julia Ogden, Women of Achievement Awards, 57 Priestgate, Peterborough, PE1 1JW.

Alternatively, e-mail your entry to julia.ogden@peterboroughtoday.co.uk.

Closing date for entries is 2pm, Friday, June 13.