to think you don't ask if someone is the grandparent unless its OBVIOUS

[SheepingStandingUp]

lets pretend i'm feeling light-hearted about this.

Man in shop (MIS): Are they twins?
Me (looking at identically dressed and looking children the same size): Yes
MIS: Oh lovely, How old are they?
Me: 2.5
MIS: Oh they're big aren't they
Me: Yup, got their long legs from Dad, not from me!

He talks to his friend for a bit

MIS: They are big for their age though aren't they
Me: Sure are
MIS: Are you their Nan.
Me (Stare him in the eyes, smilelessly). No.
MIS: Oh erm i was just thinknig how big they are.... scuttles out the shop.

So aibu to ask how old you reckon i must LOOK for him to ask?

I hear you, @SheepingStandingUp !

I’m 42 (and look slightly younger, I think). DH is 58 (and probably looks a bit older).

I’m 5 months pregnant and apparently hiding it well based on what happened at the weekend.

We were in a baby shop looking for maternity clothes. DH got distracted by the baby monitors and was talking about one that a colleague of his has and says is wonderful. The shop assistant came over and asked us if we needed it for babysitting (I assume grandchildren). 🙄 She did look slightly embarrassed when I said no, it was for our first child together, but I think she covered it well and continued with her sales pitch. 😂

It’s nothing to be ashamed of either.

That’s very outdated actually. IVF does not equal twins now because most clinics are very unwilling to transfer more than one embryo at a time - they try to avoid multiples as they cause greater harm to mother and babies. They will usually only do it if your embryos are poor quality or you’re older and your embryos are more likely to fail. Plus chances of a live birth are greater if you transfer single embryos (albeit IVF has quite low chances of success per round).

When someone young (30s/e.40s)is a grandparent I just assume it’s one of those families with recurrent teen pregnancies across the generations.

But then I’m a barren and bitter 40 year old, who am I to talk. I wish I got knocked up as a teen, my eggs might have worked then…

That's nothing. at my last OBGYN appointment there was a woman in the waiting room with twin toddlers and a newborn. She told me she was 56! She looked like their great grandmother 😫

Burnley 33

But more people aren’t grandparents by their 40s. Average age to have your first child in the UK is currently around 29, and allowing for the average age to have a child 29 years ago (25), your average grandma should be mid-50s when the grandchild is a newborn.

Obviously there are outliers but it would never occur to me someone in their 40s was a grandparent: it’s one of those “technically possible, but unlikely” scenarios. But as someone pointed out upthread, it’s very location-dependent – I’m in London and surrounded by 40-something first-time mums.

This is interesting on the average ages over time and by location. Even over time, a grandparent in their 40s is an outlier, not the norm – on average. Zoom in by location and the picture changes but if you’re talking about the UK as a whole, most people are not grandparents by 40 or in their early 40s: www.google.com/amp/s/www.comparethemarket.com/life-insurance/content/changing-age-of-uk-parents/%3famp

@SheepingStandingUp No one has ever asked me directly if my twins are from IVF.
Lots of people ask if twins run in my family, and sometimes I'll say it was ivf.

But averages in this scenario are fairly meaningless and if you have two women, one of them has her first baby at 18 and the other at 40, the average age of first baby in that group is 29 and you still have half the group in a position for the first grandchild to be born when the woman is in her mid to late 30s.

Expand this across the population and you can see how it's not unusual for people to be grandparents before 40.

My mum was a grandma by the age of 40 and several of my friends in their 40s have children who are late teens/early adults. It's not outside the realms of possibility to be mistaken for a grandma in your 40s.

You can’t win I don’t think! I had twins in my early 30s (London) and people used to ask if I was the nanny. Someone even asked to speak to the ‘lady of the house’ once when I answered the door. In our neighbourhood most of the mothers of twins were in their late 30s/early 40s.

It's got nothing to do with bitching about teen Mom's. Most people I know had kids in their 20,s or 30s so I'd never think Nan unless into the 50s at least so someone asking me if I'm nan suggests to me I look that old. It's looking like a50 year old that feels insulting

IVF twins are unlikely to be identical (and if they are it's got nothing to do with IVF)

I had mine in late twenties/early thirties (not twins though) and I’ve been asked several times if I am their nanny! I’m also in an area where people tend to have children a bit later so it is probably that, but it does also make me slightly paranoid about my parenting and what I must be doing to make people think I’m not their mum 🤔

IVF twins are unlikely to be identical (and if they are it's got nothing to do with IVF)

Not completely true.
I was warned there was a higher chance of an embryo splitting causing identical twins with IVF. Than in a natural pregnancy because the embryos were being chosen based on their quality, higher the quality the more likely they are to split.

Actually identical twins ARE more common in IVF pregnancies. Something about the process seems to trigger more embryos to split after transfer.

Dinoteeth explained it better!

I had a ds at 43..had cause to take him and ds 20 to hospital.. Then nurse asked if older ds did his turn of nights.

I looked a bit 🤔until I realised she thought he was the df!! Ds was mortified! More so because he had been eyeing up another nurse!!
Never been accused of being dgm though.

My nanny was 38 when I was born so it's not unreasonable to think you're the grandparent if you're around that age.

a) A 38yo woman with a baby is much MUCH more likely to be the mother than the grandmother, unless you live in the year 1953 or in certain parts of the world like India, where childbearing is mostly confined to very young women. If you live in the UK in 2022 and you actually go around asking 38yo women you see about "your grandchild," you are going to get into some really awkward social situations.

I was a Nursery Nurse .One day a chap came in looked the wrong side of 60 to me .I said to my Supervisor "Here comes Grandad" She said never to assume anything .Sure enough he was the daddy! Young wife though. LO about 2!

A TA thought I was DS's Nan. I'm 45 and he's 10 so I guess it's possible but unlikely.

I just assumed it's because she's young and so everyone seems really old plus I am in no way stylish.

Oddly in the town I'm from it would be quite common to be a nan at my age but in the town where I live it would be very unusual.

@SheepingStandingUp just saw you're in the Black Country, that'll be why. That's where I'm from so very common to be a nan in your 30s!

I'm 40 and out of the 60ish people I went to school with who I am still in contact with, we have dc ranging from age 6 to age 26. 3 of them are grandparents. I am somewhere at the older end of the middle with dc ranging from 8 to 16. If I saw someone my age with a toddler I would think they were the granny but I would never assume in case I got it wrong and offended.

Also when I was a teenager and wearing the uniform of the nursery where I worked I was pushing a triple buggy with 3 toddlers who looked nothing alike (I mean really nothing alike, as in 1 was from india, one was chinese and the other had white blonde hair and blue eyes). I got ranted at by some old bloke who thought they were all mine. TBH I was more offended that he thought I would wear a paint stained yellow polo shirt with teddy bears on by choice .

Given that someone I was in school with was a grandparent aged 38, I would say around 40 or above.

I worked out today my Mom was a Nan at 39 from slightly older DSis, but actually I don't know anyone my age who is a grandparent already. All my school mates had kids in their 30s, the Nans at the school gate are at least 50s. I don't think it's typical enough to justify assuming it's the norm enough to ask people