Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

Have you ever been mistaken for someone else?

36 replies

WhatifIfeellikeacat · 07/10/2020 15:05

When I was younger, I was mistaken for someone else on a few occasions. Once, the person looked clearly annoyed with me as I probably looked baffled. My DM told me that once she was travelling and saw a woman who looked just like her. Together they would look like sisters.
I have read that some strangers look very similar and some look nearly identical.

OP posts:
EsterOdesavitch · 07/10/2020 15:11

Yeah, every time I go in my local Tesco Express at the moment. People keep grinning inanely at me and saying, "Hi Emma!"

WTF, I am not Emma.

Original poster
WhatifIfeellikeacat · 07/10/2020 15:17

People keep grinning inanely at me and saying, "Hi Emma!" 🤣🤣

OP posts:
permanentlyfedup · 07/10/2020 15:25

Yes - I had the weirdest conversation years ago with a substitute teacher who was utterly convinced I was someone she knew from a nightclub/pub in a city 30 miles away . She was convinced she’d met me there at the weekend and kept on at me about it for that lesson .

It was the most bizarre conversation - I was about 12 or 13 years old and had never been to a nightclub . I wonder now if she wasn’t actually well or something !!

bearlyactive · 07/10/2020 15:44

I once got hugged from behind by a complete stranger at school, I must have been 15 or so. But that's it luckily!

Iminaglasscaseofemotion · 07/10/2020 15:49

Only once but I think it was because the girl was drunk and she didn't like the person she thought I was, and wanted to start a fight. When I told her I wasn't the person she thought, she eventually had to back down because she was beginning to sound a bit crazy. She stared me out everytime she saw me after that 🤣 I just stared back. Was really weird.

PenguinsOnParade · 07/10/2020 15:54

I apparently had a doppelgänger in the next town to ours. I've had people in the street stop me to talk who I don't know. I'm really bad at recognising people so I never realised until they asked about a relative I don't have or an event I wasn't at. I think the other person moved away a few years ago as the last time I was stopped I was asked when I'd come back, which really confused me at first as I hadn't gone anywhere.

Knittedfairies · 07/10/2020 16:03

I was hailed in Washington DC by a woman who was convinced I was her friend's friend Sandra. Convinced to the point of asking why I had adopted a British accent...

FavaJava · 07/10/2020 16:08

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

022828MAN · 07/10/2020 16:10

Not directly assumed to be someone else, but people frequently ask me if I've got a sister as I look like someone they know. I must just have 'one of those faces'.
Its weird though...

Aquamarine1029 · 07/10/2020 16:12

I apparently have a doppelganger, too.

Several years ago, a colleague approached me on a Monday morning slightly upset, asking why had I refused to acknowledge him at a shop over the weekend. I was not at that shop, in fact I was 200 miles away the whole weekend visiting family which I tried to proved to him.

He was absolutely adamant that it was me, no question in his mind. What I thought was really odd is that I'm 6 feet tall, long blond hair, so not exactly an average woman. I don't think he ever really believed it wasn't me.

DonkeysDontRideBicycles · 07/10/2020 16:16

Mum was sure I was coming back from university during the second year and staying with a local friend. She thought she saw me more than once. Same colour hair, same build, my kind of clothes.
I was rather relieved to never see that person myself when home.

GeologyRox · 07/10/2020 16:18

I'm often mistaken for one of the nurses at the local doctors. To the point where people have told me this or that ailment has got better/worse etc.
Once, the person looked clearly annoyed with me as I probably looked baffled.
Had this too, people getting annoyed with me because I'm not who they thought I was..... Baffling!

Creamcakeandrhinos · 07/10/2020 16:22

I used to go to work by train every day and used to see the same guard who always said hello to me. One day I passed him and he said your sister is on the train already, I don’t have a sister.

Another time I was in a supermarket and a guy came up to me and said ‘what a fantastic time we had last night at so and so’s’ I looked at him full in the face and said ‘sorry I don’t know you’ he was shocked and said ‘well if your going to be like that then’ and walked off. Whoever it was, was certainly having a better time than me!

stellabluesky · 07/10/2020 16:30

Back in the 80s I had a doppelgänger called Caroline. I worked in central London and used to regularly walk down Regent Street and also pop into Liberty's to look at all the beautiful things. I was often approached in those places by Sloaney types who thought I was someone called Caroline.

Kind of wished I was as I was a poor student nurse at the time from a working class background whereas Caroline, judging by the questions/ conversations I had seemed to go away for the weekend a lot, go to clubs I couldn't afford and had a horse! She was clearly a bit of a joker (or thought she was) as when I explained I wasn't Caroline, many thought it was one of 'my jokes'.

spiderlight · 07/10/2020 16:34

A very odd little woman once linked arms with me at a zebra crossing over a busy, complicated junction and told me in great detail about Jean from the post office's daughter's operation while we were crossing the road. I couldn't get a word in to tell her that I wasn't who she thought I was and had no idea who she was talking about. She finished her story and just said goodbye and shot off.

Beks1 · 07/10/2020 16:39

I had a friend at school who I was always mistaken for, I don't think we looked alike apart from having the same colour hair but apparently we looked very alike

cherrybakewelllll · 07/10/2020 16:45

A friend once sent me a picture of a girl on a train and even I thought it was me!

NemosPoorlyFinn · 07/10/2020 16:47

When I was working in retail a lady I was serving was adamant I knew her son glen 🤷🏻‍♀️
I don't know a glen still don't know a glen some years later
She wasn't having any of it 🤔

amusedbush · 07/10/2020 16:53

No, but other people have been mistaken for me. Apparently I have a really generic face.

My granny phoned me to tell me off for ignoring her on the bus (wasn't me!) and my own mother asked a stranger what they were doing at her work, thinking it was me.

When I was a child, I had a friend who also had dark hair and glasses. She returned my bike to my garden after borrowing it and my mum banged on the window and told her that dinner was ready. I was upstairs!

Fuck's sake Hmm

SimonJT · 07/10/2020 16:56

Yes, mistaken for a musician in a restaurant, it got me a free meal. I have been mistaken for him a handful of times.

Readandwalk · 07/10/2020 16:56

Many many people have told me I look like their grandmother. Different people for years. They usually add "from her younger photo".

So I have black and white sepia face.

tothesea · 07/10/2020 16:57

I was mistaken for someone with a very unusual name which stuck in my head. About 5 years later I met her in a nightclub on the other side of the country. When she said her name I said Oh I was mistaken for you once!! It was freaky.

Twospaniels · 07/10/2020 17:02

There was a ‘thing’ a little while ago about twin strangers. It was really interesting, but to me only a handful of the pairs looked like each other.

FinallyHere · 07/10/2020 17:04

I'm often mistaken for a very lovely, very unglamorous 'celeb'. I was part of a circle meeting regularly who were convinced I was her but incognito for the purpose of the group. One meeting coincided with her program on the radio. I left it running thinking they would spot the difference.

Nope, they nudged each other, indicating the speaker convinced that I was the sort of person who would leave her own program playing in the background.

I can hardly complain, it's much more flattering for me than for them.

JemimaTiggywinkle · 07/10/2020 17:07

I had a phase a couple of years ago where everyone I met at a new job was convinced they had met me before somewhere.
None of them named a specific person they thought I was... they just felt like they had met me before (they hadn’t).