Here you are, Riven 
Elizabeth, 76, teacher
I used to say to my children: ?I know I haven?t been a very good mother, but I?ll be a really good grandmother. I know I?ve got it in me.? I went back to work when my eldest two were under three. Very few of my contemporaries worked. In those days women were supposed to be mothers, and if you weren?t any good at it, you were looked down upon. I joined the Housewives? Register discussion forum, which I suppose was an early Mumsnet, but if you didn?t have a car you were a bit stuck. I felt I was a prisoner in my own home a lot of the time.
By the time Justine was born I was teaching in a comprehensive school. I went back to work when she was five months old, and she just got on with it. She didn?t seem to resent my not being there as much as the other two. My elder daughter always said: ?I will never work when my children are small.? She thinks children need your full time until they?re about 11 ? which is all true, of course, and I do feel terrible about it. But I?d have gone completely mad if I?d stayed at home, and I think that would have been worse than not being there.
I was born into a cockney family. I took elocution lessons, and my greatest wish was for my children to have ?Oxford accents?. Of course, none of them did, so that was a big disappointment. Justine didn?t have to reach up in the way I did, because everything was there for her. She was brilliant at maths, English, sport, drama? When talents were being handed out, she got more than her share. But her school reports all complained she messed about and ruined everyone else?s chances. She was ringleader of a very noisy gang, and in a way she still is.
I had to leave school at 16 because we needed the money, but I always thought it would be lovely to go to university, so I wanted my children to get on and do their best. Justine got into Oxford easily, and she?d hate me saying this but I don?t think she put herself out too much. She?ll probably tell you I was a very, very critical mother, but I think that?s a generational thing.
People like me, who hadn?t had anything and wanted more for their children, tended to criticise.
I thought I was helping by saying: ?I think you can do better.? Whereas everything Justine?s kids do is absolutely brilliant, even if it?s ghastly.
With her drive and brains, Justine could never have been a full-time mum, but it?s not necessarily easier now to leave your children than it was then. Hers do resent it. One of the girls wrote her a very long letter saying: ?You and Dad are never here. All we want is to be with you.? It was quite heart-rending. But on the whole I?d say they?ve accepted it. Justine makes a point of watching them play sport ? she pushes this one back on me, because I often missed sports days and was always late picking her up. All working women try to pack too much in, but Justine is extraordinarily patient. However tired she is, if someone?s having a tantrum she?ll take time to find out why, whereas I was always inclined to say: ?Go to your room.?
I?ve noticed that some of her employees are quite scared of her. She?s got a very tough streak ? it?s no accident Mumsnet has taken off as it has. If she sets her heart on something, eventually she gets it, but there is a price. At weekends, I sometimes say to her: ?Just put your phone away. Let?s have one day without it.? And she says: ?I can?t.? She and Ian [The Guardian?s deputy editor, Ian Katz] live on the edge the whole time, and I think that?s very tough for them both. I do have a lot of fun with the children, and that?s helped her a lot. But I?m wary of giving advice, even if she asks for it. I never think she takes much notice of what I say. I?m very clear that my role is to let her bounce what she?s feeling off me, then go her own way.
Justine, 43, co-founder of Mumsnet
I always felt other people?s mothers somehow did it properly. Their packed lunches were a bit more packed, they were picked up on time, and their mums knew what was going on. But I wasn?t envious. I had this visceral pride in the fact that my mum worked, and felt she was far cooler than those who fussed over the sandwiches. Mum?s drive and ambition was wholly to do with a desire to improve her status and prove herself intellectually. She could never have been the little woman sitting at home, and I think that was a feminist thing ? never expressed but clearly felt. She came from a council estate; her dad was a tram driver and her mother was a cleaner. Her parents burnt her school books at one stage, but by the time she was 16 she?d changed the way she spoke to such a point that people meeting her wouldn?t have known where she came from. She used to get her boyfriends to drop her in the next street ? she?d never take anyone home because her mother dropped her aitches. I think it?s hilarious that she still has this ?telephone voice?, but that was very much the spirit of the time. It was about hauling yourself out of your class so you would be employable.
She used to correct me a lot, but I don?t remember it feeling oppressive. It was all about not wanting us to get too big for our boots. If I said, ?I came second in the chemistry test with 92%,? she?d say: ?Who got 94%?? Yet she wasn?t particularly pushy. Perhaps because she was so busy, I was left to get on with it and felt very trusted. There was none of the micromanaging we do today. I had this sense that she had her own life, so wasn?t obsessively interested in mine.
On family holidays she was the person we wanted to be with. We spent our time trying to make her laugh, because it meant so much to us when we did, but her attention was hard won. People probably find her difficult to get to know. She doesn?t do small talk ? neither of us does. She?ll come and help at the drop of a hat if I ask her to, but she won?t say: ?How are you getting on this week??
Mum?s incredibly good fun to be around, in a Grumpy Old Women sort of way. She?s an absolutely atrocious cook, partly because she never follows a recipe. She?ll always ?use something up? rather than buy what?s needed. We?re all terribly rude and she never takes it personally. She has a very wry, self-deprecating sense of humour, which my daughters find hysterical.
She has an amazing relationship with all my children because she really does want to just sit and chat and muck about. Everyone wants to be with Grandma; she?s the most magnetic person in the room.
There wasn?t a lot of play going on when I was growing up, or crafts, or baking, so through the prism of what a good mother is I think she probably failed. I try to do things differently, but find it doesn?t come easily to me either. And she was overly critical, which, since we?ve discovered parenting in our own right, we?ve all thrown back at her. But I was terribly proud of her for going out to work when it wasn?t fashionable, and now my daughters enjoy the fact that their mother does something that is occasionally glamorous, and that I?m able to get Gok Wan?s autograph.
They all have a go sometimes. I remember cycling to nursery, with my youngest singing ?Mummy, Mummy, don?t go to work? to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. But it doesn?t leave me jibbering, because I know they?ll be fine.
My mother has said to me: ?I wish I hadn?t worked so hard and had been a bit less ambitious.? But I felt I had a fairly idyllic childhood. She and I got on almost to the point of embarrassing hero worship. When I was about 18, a boyfriend said: ?God, you just think your mum?s great, don?t you?? And I still do. She has this very strong work ethic, which means she feels she must be useful. I have the most enormous respect for that, and for the way she bettered herself. And within a quite uncuddly environment I always felt very loved.