AIBU to think that is is completely normal to call your parents Mummy and Daddy as an adult.

[MillicentSmythFortescue]

I read a thread yesterday where someone mentioned people calling their parents 'Mummy and Daddy' in parenthood. A couple of people said they called their parents 'Mummy and Daddy too'. I associate this name with young children, when I was a child everyone converted to Mum and Dad around the age of 7. Trivial I know and none of my business but I was wondering how widespread it is?

AIBU - it is normal to call your parents Mummy and Daddy in adulthood in a non-ironic way.

It's just the norm in some families, yes often posher ones. I don't see why that requires mockery tbh. It wouldn't be regarded as ok to mock someone for being lower class on the basis of what they call their family members, would it? People can't help their upbringing.

Bit weird to be honest, it’s a very childlike way to refer to your parents. Much like calling your father ‘Dada’ forever iyswim.

I always called my parents Mummy and Daddy. Mum, Dad, Nan and Grandad were all considered common. My grandparents were Grandma and Grandpa and Granny (I never knew her husband). I always cringed at Mum and Dad although I sometimes referred to them as M and D. When talking about them to others, I always say my mother or my father.
We were quite posh I suppose!

What does aunt mean as opposed to auntie? @WotWouldCJDo?

I refused to be called mum when dd tried to start calling me this around age 7. I wish to differentiate from the parenting I had. Part of that is not sharing the same name. She refers to us as “my mum and / or dad” and calls us mummy and daddy.

I’m not sure why people have such a reaction to how others refer to their relatives.

My mum has been Mother since I was a cheeky teenager. Aunts are still Auntie to me, and my Nannie was referred to as such until the day she died, by all of her dgc. My strapping teenage son still calls me Mummy on occasion. It makes me feel warm inside because I know he is doing it to make me smile.

All of this is important and relevant to me, but I’m unsure why anyone outside our family would care a jot.

I was ridiculed for calling Mummy -Mummy aged 12 so I stopped and she was Mum she was upset.

Mine did it to me -and suprisingly I was also upset.

I sometimes call my Dad ‘Daddy’ if I want something I’m 37...haha!

I say it quite often (more when I want something 😂).

My mum is particularly down right now as we're at opposite ends of the country, so I say it a lot as I know it makes her smile.

Other times they're Ma and Pa (said in Nick Cotton voice).

I am definitely not posh.

Jinx @PurpleFlower1983 😂

@unchienandalusia

Lots of inverse snobbery on this thread. If it were reversed it would be deemed totally unacceptable.

Yes OP. I'm looking at you.

Deep down....guilty as charged . No doubt there are things that I do that people find common.

I think Pops is sweet that someone mentioned.

Lots of inverse snobbery on this thread. If it were reversed it would be deemed totally unacceptable.

Absolutely.

It definitely sounds different from an Irish person; it's incredibly sweet.
I really hate it when spoken from a cut-glass English accent.

Aunt? Auntie? What? Someone kindly explain the difference we all know. I have no idea what it is.

@Feminmister

KittyMcKitty I am south east too. It’s a class thing. Most adult people in the south east do not say mummy and daddy.

I'm in the south east, too. I've only got one friend who uses mummy and daddy, to her extremely wealthy parents who still buy her cars, holidays, furniture etc (said friend is past age 55) She also has supper 😂

I do.

I call my Mum - mummy. She didn't like Mum.

Her choice, not mine. I'm not posh.

Like @KittyMcKitty I think it’s a parts of South East thing. We are still Mummy and Daddy to our young adult DC as are most of our friends to their teen/young adult DC. We are not all all unusual. I’ve never thought of it as childish; it’s just a name. It’s the norm in our family. My mother and grandmother both referred to their mothers as Mummy right through to old age.

In recent years, it’s morphed sometimes into Mother and Father which always sounds to me as though I’m living in a Jane Austen novel! I think they originally used it ironically and it’s stuck, but a few of their friends seem to do this too.

On DC2s phone we are referred to as Parental No 1 and Parental No 2. I was pleased to see I’m No 1

Mind you I eat supper as well, so shoot me!

* I only call my dad daddy if I want something. Although when i do that he will reply by calling me daughter*

That made me smile and lifted my heart. Miss my dear dad and his bear hugs still 💕

We are definitely not posh but both my children still call us Mummy and Daddy, one is 7 so I would expect him to but our eldest is 12 and showing no signs of calling us anything else. Her friends still use Mummy and Daddy too. FWIW we haven't asked them to although equally haven't asked them not to!

Dp does. So do his siblings. My own adult kids call me mama.

@Dahlietta

Lots of inverse snobbery on this thread. If it were reversed it would be deemed totally unacceptable.

Absolutely.

It definitely sounds different from an Irish person; it's incredibly sweet.
I really hate it when spoken from a cut-glass English accent.

But it's the truth. I don't like it, not that it really matters. Just like some people don't like it when people drop their 'H's'

Just like some people don't like Nan and Grandad and find it common. It's interesting to hear the different regional differences and how some people find comfort in using 'Mummy and Daddy'.That's something I'd not considered. I am from the South East, from a working-class background, in a professional occupation and people have actually called me 'posh' a few times because I'm well-spoken. My parents were really strict when we were growing up about the way we spoke.

[quote MillicentSmythFortescue]@ShirleyPhallus
I think Nanny is more common and I can say that as someone who has/had Nanny's and Nan's.
I'm from a working-class background and my brother married someone from an upper-middle-class background.
My parents are called Nanny and Grandad, her parents are Grandma and Grandpa, the latter sounding much posher somehow.[/quote]
I was once teaching a novel that featured an upper-class Edwardian English family, and mostly dealt with the young children and the rivalry between the staff who looked after and taught them, the governess and elderly nanny, who hated one another.

One student ( I think these were final-year undergraduates) had constructed an entire theory about the novel based on her belief that the nanny was the posh children’s grandmother, despite the fact the family lived in a Palladian mansion and were screamingly posh, but the nanny lived in a tiny attic next to the nursery, wore a uniform and apron, and had a pronounced Cockney accent.

I have never called my mother Mummy.