Terrible insult - I am devastated

[mousymary]

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.

My friend was once mistaken for my Mum.....we were both 22 at the time!

Don't take it personally. Some folks are just completely shit at gauging how old people are

This. I once accidentally got into a National Trust house on a family ticket because the cashier thought I was the child of the couple in front of me in the queue. I was 26 and they were - at most - 2 years older.

Some people are amazingly inobservant.

I really wouldn't take it personally. Depending on lighting/clothing/etc I've:

Been asked by a random 14 year old (I think ?) to sign a consent form for a piercing and pretend I was her mum (I was 22)

Been id'd for alcohol last year (I'm 32)

Working temp job in retail, I Id'd a 35 year old and have thought my 23 year old manager was in their 30's

Basically outsider attention is all a bit random so it is ridiculous to link ones self esteem to it.

If you genuinely want to make sone changes to your appearance ( I always do, it's part of the fun of life for me and a major creative thing to express myself) then work out and play with your dress sense and get stuck on on one of the long running threads here

but make it FUN ffs.

(Even not in terms of age, I've had times when I'm considered the prettiest woman in the room and times when I've been viewed as too plain to even notice.

Even Kate Middleton and Angelina Jolie will have lots of people criticising their looks.

Of course it's nice to feel sexy and desirable from time to time but I'm assuming you didn't want to shag this woman

Basing your self esteem on what some randomer thinks is the emotional road to hell )

You know how small children assume height and age are directly linked, so that the tallest person in the room is absolutely unequivocally the oldest even when the tallest person is a 15 year old and the second tallest is 30 and the shortest adult is 104?

There are adults who still subconsciously work on that basis to some extent when not paying attention...

One of my boyfriends 'Paul' went to a party and someone i hadn't seen for years (who had last seen me with my exH 'Peter') went up to him and said 'Hi Peter, crikey you've put on weight!'

A barmaid at our local pub once thought I was my Dh's oldest daughter. He is two months older than me and was not best pleased. I don't think it means I look amazingly young. It means she was a heady mix of shortsighted and a bit dumb and only really noticed that I am very short.

I used to live somewhere everyone got IDed when buying alcohol (local bylaw, even 80yos had to produce ID to buy a bottle of wine). I still liked the implication that I might be possibly young enough not to be able to buy alcohol. (I am obviously vain, I know)

There was a thread on here once where we put our pics up for posters to guess our age, the answers varied wildly. It is all just opinion!

I don't think I'd do that in case it was confirmed that I do look 66!

Don't use the microsoft age recognition software then, OP! Or at least not if you wear specs - when it first came out I uploaded a picture without specs and one with, and my age ranged from 22 to 68 (I was about 40 at the time).

Sometimes I get my 7 year old granddaughter from school. I'm 56 but think I look a bit younger. The teacher always tells DGD that her auntie is outside to collect her. DGD always comes out hooting with laughter whilst YELLING that her teacher thinks I'm her auntie (whilst I preen at looking young enough to be my DD's sister) and how HILARIOUS it is because I'm HER GRANNY. By which time not only the teacher but every fecking parent in the playground knows that I'm actually her grandma. Thanks kiddo.

I get it. I'm massively vain and always up for talking about how to dress when your body's crumbling and your face is disappearing. If someone made that type of comment to me, I like to think I'd laugh, but I live in the same world as you do and I see and hear the same propaganda. I'm not immune.

I still have this dream that our kids will be wiser than we are; that they won't grow up to think the greatest compliment you can pay a woman is to tell her she looks younger than she is; that to them, overestimating her age will just be a mistake, not a blow to her self esteem. Seems like a very long way off.

Love S&B but it really gets me down sometimes. What a shit message we're passing on.

I met a colleague whilst out with my 7 year old. He asked if she was my grand daughter...and was the horribly embarrassed when I informed him I was her mum. I actually wasn't offended at all - I have a grown up son (28) so am old enough to be a grandma (am 47). He clearly felt awful tho and still cringes when he sees me.

dd asked in all seriousness if I was born in WW2. Her elder brother almost choked on his dinner he was laughing that much. I told her grandad was only just born in WW2. They are learning about the war at school

Lynnm63 - i had similar but my son was studying the Romans instead!!

My grandfather was recently in hospital. All I be hospital staff, when speaking to me, referred to him as my dad. There's a 54yr age difference. Yes it's technically possible but it was the he assumption that was quite eye opening for me. I'm 42,
Similarly people look shocked when I tell them I have a 3yo dd.
I must look totally shit.
I'm. It that bothered though. I think I look fabulous.

In my early twenties, at a well known night club for the indie crowd in leeds, I was having a drunken snog with a man who looked similar age... who asked if I wanted to "go for a walk" (wink wink) as he'd "always wanted to pull an older woman"

that was on a night out when I'd made an effort!!

I did not go for a walk. The cheeky sod.

Try not to worry OP some people don't see age or register it well.

When my brother got into dinosaurs as a child and realised they lived a long time ago, he asked Mum if she had had a pet dinosaur when she was a little girl!

A couple of people have mistaken my best friend for my mum. She's only 49 and seven years older than me. She looks great for her age but I look quite young so some people just make a snap judgement.

oops!

I made this mistake once, with a woman I was working with was in her late 30s when I was about 30, she looked the absolute spit of one of my teachers, so I asked her.. when she said 'how old were you?' and I said '6'

if she was 20 when I was 6, she'd have been 44, so not that bad I suppose, but enough to make her go a bit quiet..

The thing is some people are thick. In my old job a customer thought my friend and I were twins. She is 5 years younger than me and a size 8. I was 14/16, curvy she was straight up and down. She was a foot taller than me and we looked nothing alike facially.

However we both wore glasses.

You probably look nothing at all like euchre daughter's friends Mum.

I also have a white friend with dark hair. One day at work someone said to her. 'Oh hi clearly Chinese name, I didn't know you worked here too'.

Oh op! I hope you are getting over this now. I will tell you a good one, a few weeks ago a doctor mistook my dh for my father. I was ill and had no makeup on which probably made me look younger. He is 15 years older than me but certainly doesn't look old manly yet. I don't know which of the three of us was more embarrassed

Why is looking older so upsetting? What is it about aging that you assume to be negative? Have you read 'The Beauty Myth' by Naomi Wolf? If not, I would highly recommend it as a starting point to rebuild your self esteem in a way that doesn't depend on others perceptions of your appearance.