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Original poster

Terrible insult - I am devastated

108 replies

mousymary · 24/04/2017 11:41

Was out yesterday and a woman stopped me and asked if I was Sam's mum. No, I reply, not Sam's mum. She goes on to say I am spitting image of her daughter's friend's mother, and so I ask if she is confusing me with another woman whose mum I might be, and, if so, how old is her daughter and friend.

Forty !!!!! I actually exclaimed "Forty! You think I could have a forty-year-old daughter!!" And I walked off saying I was going home to soak in a bath of Oil of Olay.

I am so upset. I am 52, but to have a 40-year-old dd... well, that would make me 56 at absolute best but in all probability... mid 60s.

Now, I don't take that much care of my appearance, but now I'm staring in the mirror thinking perhaps I do look old for my age. I don't wear "old lady" clothes, nor do I have grey hair. Is there anywhere that does a Ten Years Younger service? I feel really down about this.

OP posts:
Littledidsheknow · 24/04/2017 12:58

I was mistaken for my own mother at a family funeral a few months ago!
I tried not to mind too much: the person involved was a relative of my dad's, and as my parents are long divorced, said relative hadn't seen my mum for about 40 years. They were probably recalling my young mum and noting that I looked like her but a bit older, that's all. However my mum is nearly 70 and I was 47, so I was still a bit Hmm.

I think people just spot a resemblance sometimes and don't too closely about the age... I go back to my home town every few years and sometimes think I see a familiar face, someone from school. Then realise that if it was really the person I was thinking of they'd be pushing 50 too, not 20- something!

Flossimodo · 24/04/2017 12:59

When you see a striking resemblance to someone you know, you're not really thinking about age - you are focused on the resemblance.
This woman was probably not thinking that you looked sixty, but that you looked like her daughter's friend but were obviously a bit older.

I think you are overthinking it.

Morphene · 24/04/2017 13:06

op you don't sound so secure, given you are state it is a 'Terrible insult' to be picked as being a whole 4 years (at a minimum) older than you actually are, and are 'devastated' by this.

Stop watching adverts and respect the awesomeness of older ladies.

I actually would like to look at least 5-10 years older than I am. I teach undergrads and they give me shit reviews on the basis that I am 'inexperienced', 'not an academic', and 'don't look like I know what I am doing'. None of that is true. I am an associate professor, not a postgraduate student (as I have been mislabelled on many an occasion).

Of course being female while teaching physics isn't helping either.....anyway the point is, we should actually be proud of turning into older women, especially given it is inevitable.

Men may not often want to appear older than they are, but at least they get a window from 18 to 30, where someone thinking they are older or more mature is giving them a compliment. Women aren't even allowed that.

Deploycharitygoats · 24/04/2017 13:10

A few years ago, I was waiting for the lift with a colleague. Someone approached and said "ooh, is this your son on work experience?" He was 20, I was 26.

Now, if I'd made this mistake, I'd have apologised profusely. Not this woman, oh no. She kept digging. And digging. "Oh, you look much more mature than him! And (to him) you're a bit scruffy, so I thought, you know!"

Swimminguphill · 24/04/2017 13:14

OP I have nothing helpful for you - I'd be gutted too. I tend to live inside my own head and just walk around assuming I look fabulous, or at least unremarkable. It's coming up against others' perceptions that jars so much. I did get described (by my manager) as Amazonian which was quite annoying. But I would like to thank you as I think a lot of the hurt is the surprise and now I am forewarned and forearmed. I just need to think of some witty quips to respond with should this happen to me...

TyrionLannistersShadow · 24/04/2017 13:15

A few years ago I went to visit my brothers new baby in the maternity hospital. Visiting was very strictly policed and you had to state your name relationship to the baby before being allowed up. I gave my name and the security person asked me was I the grandmother..........I was 35, and only 2 years older than my brother!

NoYouDontKnowItAll · 24/04/2017 13:17

age determination ain't an exact science and i regularly get it wrong but i've been on the receiving end in not very good ways as well, it's not worth getting wound up about

Dulcimena · 24/04/2017 13:23

@Flossimodo posted exactly what I was going to. You're over-thinking it. She didn't stop you because of age, she stopped you because of the striking resemblance.

ClinkyMonkey · 24/04/2017 13:27

Some people don't even consider what age you look. They just get it into their head that you are/look like someone else they know. My friend is in her mid thirties and still gets asked if she is over 21 if buying alcohol - and yet she was mistaken for a woman in her fifties because she resembled her. The person was quite adamant, as if my friend wasn't quite sure of her own identity!

DevilsDumplings · 24/04/2017 13:29

I feel your pain OP.

DH & I were once approached in an instance of wrong identity. When we explained to the person we weren't who he thought we were he replied 'no, off course you're not 'Sid & Betty', you're fatter Shock.

Cheeky bleeder!

NancyWake · 24/04/2017 13:36

Why are we brainwashed into thinking it's so much better to look younger than older? Does it matter?

Preoccupation with youth has to be one of the most ridiculous and shallow aspects of our current culture.

It leads to all kinds of bêtises - men with badly dyed hair and ill-advised toupés; women with strangely stretched faces and leopard-print leggings.

Macron's wife is 20 years older than him. A bit more appreciating people for who they are and what's important in life, less counting the wrinkles - we'd be a much saner society.

Bluntness100 · 24/04/2017 13:37

Op. I doubt she was doing the maths and as you said sams mum could be mid fifties on and look great. I don't she thought you looked mid sixties, more in the same age range as sams mum, and if you met sams mum you may actually be flattered, irrelevant of her age, as she may be absOlutely stunning and look years younger.

Bluntness100 · 24/04/2017 13:39

Oh and I agree this is nothing to do with gender, most blokes don't want to be told they look a decade older either.

Lolly49 · 24/04/2017 13:45

Had it all over the years DH being asked if he is my Dad he is a year younger than me.Also when dc's used to be dropped at school by my Df mum's thought he was my DH as my son looked so much like him .Just laugh it off .

Original poster
mousymary · 24/04/2017 13:48

With respect, Morphene, you are obviously not very old if you are deemed too young looking and inexperienced to be a professor. It is fine to be so high minded about the irrelevance of age when you are some way away from being affected by an age-related insult.

I remember (mildly) joking about zimmers and Tena Lady a while back and mil went mad and said that I had no right to make fun of things that were a reality to people of her age. It did make me think, tbh.

OP posts:
Morphene · 24/04/2017 13:54

I'm nearly 40. I use Tena already, and I'm kinda over feeling embarrassed about it tbh.

It's good that you understood you MIL's point, but you basically just started a thread saying you are devastated to be thought of as 55.

How is anyone who IS 56, or god forbid older, supposed to feel about that?

What exactly is so terrible about being 56, that even being thought to have achieved that age is 'devastating'?

At least consider stopping being part of the problem!

NancyWake · 24/04/2017 14:02

It sounds far more like sexism than true ageism Morphene. Would they care if they were taught by a young male physicist? He'd be seen as inspirational rather than alarming and untrustworthy.

ilovechoc1987 · 24/04/2017 14:09

Oh I'm so sorry I can understand how you must feel!!
My DPs auntie went to New York with a friend who was OLDER then her, someone in a restaurant referred to her as being her friends mum, she was mortified!.

Morphene · 24/04/2017 14:16

yes...probably mostly sexism...but comments like 'why isn't this course taught by a real physicist instead of a student' leave some ambiguity.

anyway the point is, there is nowt wrong with older women. We are all 'hopefully' going to become them, so lets stop assuming that is such a terrible fate.

MrsLupo · 24/04/2017 14:25

It is fine to be so high minded about the irrelevance of age when you are some way away from being affected by an age-related insult.

Was morphene being 'high minded'? I totally agree with her and I'm more or less your age, OP. Some people just don't have an obsession with age, and, as your thread amply demonstrates, they seem to be happier for it.

Ageing is a part of life. Would you prefer the alternative?

NancyWake · 24/04/2017 14:26

As I said I don't think they'd be questioning you looking young if you were male. They'd just see you as an aspirational prodigy.

Women can't be 'real physicists'... it's a job for a man.

BreconBeBuggered · 24/04/2017 14:29

In my head I agree 100% with Morphene, and yet, you know, I remember feeling crushed when asked if I was a young DS2's grandmother. I was in my late 30s and while it was of course entirely possible, it felt like an insult rather than a thoughtless assumption.

I've been at the end of questions in the other direction (for instance, was I my 20-year-old son's wife), which if I'm honest seemed a lot funnier.

Original poster
mousymary · 24/04/2017 14:34

Well, of course what age we are doesn't matter, and I am not a vain person, but the point is when I am 80 I won't mind being 80, but I don't want anyone to think I'm 80 now !

I think the whole point of my thread was that I am not normally vain, and I wasn't strutting around somewhere on the lookout for compliments. I was just walking along minding my own business, not thinking at all about whether I was 20 or 90, and I just felt... punctured and that perhaps I should be undertaking some emergency maintenance.

OP posts:
Morphene · 24/04/2017 14:36

I know someone who was mistaken for the mother, when she was a 35 yo grandmother, and she was totally insulted on the basis that people must somehow be judging her for being chavy and having a grandchild already.

I mean some people are going to get pissed at anything!

Seeing grown women simpering over getting asked for ID, like you should be proud to be considered too immature to buy alcohol, makes me want to shake people.

Theycalledmethewildrose · 24/04/2017 14:48

A teenager once asked me if I would buy cigarettes for him in the shop. I didn't understand him at first so he clarified by saying 'you can pretend to be my mum'. I was in my early twenties!