When did strangers start calling parents "mum" & "dad"?

[lizzieoak]

I suppose it's one of my job titles, but I find this a bit odd. Dr's office, dentist's, teachers, coaches ... say things like "please sign here mum" & "your DS is doing very well mum".

It makes me feel like a generic mum-beast and I want them to stop. If I say "my name is Esmerelda" they nod thoughtfully & call me mum again.

I don't spend a lot of time worrying about it, but is this odd?

It's easy for them.

I work in a school
yes all parents become mum dad gran ect

when dealing with hundreds of children and their parents I'm not going to be able to remember that you are Esmeredla and not Margaret

But there's no way they're ever going to retain the information that you're called Esmerelda. They're doing well to retain the information that little Sebastian is called Sebastian. So a generic "mum" or "dad" makes things a tad easier. I don't have a problem with it but I gather from MN that many people do.

Why do you care so much? It's hardly offensive

I don't "care so much", I said I don't spend a lot of time thinking about it. But it's just happened again and I find it ... uncomfortable. It's often unnecessary. They could say "please sign here" and "your ds is doing so well". Why call me mum? I'm quite sure I did not give birth to a giant 60 year old Aussie dentist.

It's say teachers have one class of 25, that's 25 names + 50 parents ( taking a reserved number to account for 2 parent families/ single parents and also separated parents with DPs) then you have grandparents occasionally so another 5 thats 80 names to remember and their connections.

Doctors see loads of people per day, and whilst they may see you're Esmeralda they could have seen little Tarquin son of Betty and Rosemary the daughter of Julian and it's hard to keep track

Save your concerns for when they call you dad instead (it happened to me last year. I thought I was reasonably feminine )

And also it can be a minefield for every person wanting to be addressed as Esmeralda there will be those who complain and want to be Mrs Dove, then it's not Mrs but Ms Miss or Emmy etc.

It's probably just an indication of who has to sign it mauve obvious but I bet there's also people who think the child has to sign or people who ask just to double check

I don't expect everyone to remember my name, obviously, but I don't see why that means 'Mum' has to get shoehorned in to every sentence. I had a health visitor who did this all the time: "let's just weigh the baby, Mum" "how are you doing this week, Mum?" "Okay, Mum, I've got some leaflets to give you."

I don't mind so much when nursery staff do it, as there's a lot of other children around so it makes sense they want me to know they're talking to me. But I don't get the point when there are two of us in the room.

I mean, I don't expect my dentist or my doctor or the bus driver or the shop assistant to know my name, either, but they don't usually refer to me as "Patient" or "passenger" or "customer" every sentence.

Pisses me off too. I say "I'm not your mum". They don't like that but it's true, after all.

I find it infuriating too. It's so twee. I quite understand people can't be expected to keep track of lots of names, but there's no need to call me anything under those circs, surely.

I was called Gran a few months ago, which meant someone thought I was the mother of a friend who is only a few years younger than me, and that she was the mother of my DD as well as her own DC. That upset me. Being called Mum by people more interested in my child than me seems totally acceptable.

I think it started when it stopped being appropriate to call all Mum's, Mrs Child's Surname like they did back in the 60's & 70's. Its impossible for everyone to remember what is the appropriate title or name to use now so using Mum or Dad is much easier.

I hate it too. Even worse in the third person, when a teacher (for example) says something like "Mum came in to talk about Oliver." Oliver's Mum or his mum, surely. Her name's not "Mum."

It started for me in the maternity ward. I don't think pfb even had a name yet. I was a bit wtf, I'm not Your mum.
I work with families for a job. I use mum / dad to refer to a childs parent when speaking to my manager to give her a grip on a case, but I cant bring myself to do it in front of the actual person. It's not hard to look at the paperwork! Did throw my dad when in discussion I mentioned that 'one of my parents' did /told me xyz. He spluttered 'but we're your parents'. Reminded me of what teachers kids feel like!
It isn't great manners. It always struck me as one of those crass things people do to try to build rapport.

I find it annoying, but not as annoying as when my MIL and FIL call me Mum!

It's been since people got so huffy about being called the wrong name.

When I was a child, you would automatically call a child's Mum "Mrs Childs-surname" but now there are :

People who aren't married
People who were married but are now divorced
People who are married but chose to have a different name from their child
People who don't like the term 'Mrs'
People who don't like the term 'Ms'
People who don't like the term 'Miss'
People who have surnames that are difficult to pronounce
People who don't like any term of formal address but want you to use their first name
Then you get into people being offended at you calling them Alex' when it says 'Alexandra' on their birth certificate

It started when people stopped getting married/having the same surname as their kids.

It must be confusing for them and some people get insulted when it's assumed they're 'Mrs (insert child's surname).

It's easier. Sometimes (in dentist work) you'd get multiple generations in with the same child and it's such a minefield to try and work out who is mum, who is gran (i.e. no parental responsibility) who is a sibling etc. Asking "are you mum" or "who is mum" just clears that up in one go.

Also, saying mum is a lot easier than lots of options e.g. (making a telephone referral) "mum says the child is being seen by Dr X" as opposed to "the child's mother..."

Can never win... someone will be annoyed by whatever you call them...

It's been going on for some time now, certainly since my DC were young and I used to hate it - my DC are all grown up now. I would have preferred to not be called anything; or wouldn't have minded being called 'Johnie's mum' rather than just 'mum' if they have to call me anything.

I think it's much worse than calling you Ms 'child's surname' even if that's not your name 'mum' sounds horribly patronizing, as if that's your total identity. bit like calling you 'Mrs Housewife'.

53rd has it spot on. Okay, you don't want to glance at the paperwork, just stop shoe-horning it into every sentence. I find it infantalising.

As someone pointed out, our doctors don't say "you need to take the medication Patient". It's seldom necessary to use a name - or placemarker for a name.

This morning at the dentist's the assistant came into the lobby, eyeballed the people and decided I most resembled ds & said "are you mum?" No, I'm quite vocal actually. Why couldn't she have said "Are you steve's mum?" or equivalent?

I really, really hate it but now do it all the time. I've just retrained and work in a clinical setting with children- writing such and such's mum / dad just takes too long and becomes annoyingly repetitive. I feel hideously patronising doing it and I hated having it done to me but laziness wins out. I would never refer to stranger as mum or dad to their face, though. It's just so reductive.

It has always been so.

I don't have any children. When I was in hospital with an ectopic pregnancy, (my 3rd pregnancy loss), the nurse from the maternity unit who was looking after me referred to my DH as 'Dad' - she only did it once and I'm sure it was accidental but it was upsetting for us both...