I’m directing this at older women exclusively, because this is the demographic that gives nasty & judgemental looks based on my experience.
When I was 18, my mom gave birth to my youngest sister. My mom had me in her early 20s, and had my sister at 40.
Since I was an adult, I spent a lot of time with my sister – taking her to the park, the mall, play centers, etc.
People assumed I was her mom, and it’s not a crazy assumption to make since my sister looks a lot like me. The problem was, I got some seriously nasty and judgemental stares & comments from older women. I remember one came up to me and said something like “a little young to be having children don’t you think?”
I’m now seeing this behaviour with my other sister who is 30 years old and a mom of 3. My sister looks a lot younger than she is (she could pass as 20). When I’ve gone out with her and her kids, I can’t even count the times I’ve spotted an older woman giving her nasty looks and whispering about her. I went up to a woman that was doing this and said “she’s thirty years old”. She acted surprised and apologized, telling me that she thought my sister was a teenager…
So I’m writing this PSA to everyone, but especially older women (50 and older) to mind your own damn business. Even if you correctly spot a teen mom rather than a sister, aunt, or young looking mom, it’s still NOT YOUR PLACE TO JUDGE THEM.
I’m getting to the point where I want to go up to these women and scream in their faces. I might just start doing that.
Comments
I can’t understand why anyone would scowl at a teen mom anyway – it’s not like she impregnated herself.
Over 50 here and semi pro at minding my own business!
I used to babysit my younger cousins and my little brother and the nasty looks people would give me. Like yeah we looked alike because we were related but lol what
Over 50 here and have not ever done this, because it’s not my business.
Oh man, this reminded me of something.
So, I went to Planned Parenthood for the first time to talk about birth control for my nasty periods. It was during early COVID, so my mom wasn’t allowed to come with me to the appointment (I was probably about 14 or 15).
This was before my ADHD was regulated with meds, so uncontrolled ADHD + new environment without my mom (I hadn’t gone to a doctor’s appointment without a parent in the room before) + it being about a very private and uncomfortable subject meant I was crying when I walked in. It was just very overwhelming
There was an older lady in the waiting room who was just staring daggers at me the whole time. I’m guessing she assumed I was a pregnant teen or something like that. The glares were… The emotion was pretty clearly hatred, or at least contempt
The staff were very nice though!
I was a nanny in a town where a lot of families had help and I still got told off. I wish I’d had a quippy comeback but I was just too dumbfounded.
I also wanted to know what she expected me to do about it. Like, you can’t put them back…
I remember being 14 and taking my nephews who were 3 and 4 at the time to a playground while they were having a sleepover at their grandparent’s (and my) place… the dirty looks I got from the moms there with their kids…
Especially didn’t help when the younger of the two started calling me “mommy” accidentally… and I’m there like “No… no… Aunt! I’m your AUNT!”
The moms gave me even dirtier looks for that.
Please, please say something when this kind of thing happens. You don’t need to scream or be rude. What you did for your sister was just right. These people need their assumptions challenged. Their rude, judgmental behavior harms vulnerable women.
The average father to a teen pregnancy is 6.4 years older than the mother – aka an adult
Edit:
Source:
“Adult fathers, who were responsible for 49.2% of births to teenage mothers, were a mean of 6.4 years older than the mother.”
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0029784496004814
Here are some other sources:
“Adult, postschool men father two thirds of the infants born to school-age mothers and average 4.2 years older than the senior-high mothers and 6.7 years older than the junior-high mothers. “
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8604792/
“60% of 15-17 year olds and 50% of 18-19 year olds had a partner who was three years older and 20% of all teenage mothers had a partner six or more years older.“
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7589357/
I was 14. My brother was 16.
The difference in how we were treated when we were out with our baby sister was staggering. He was a prince. He got praise. People gave him free shit. I was villain, an inconvenient obstacle, or at best an object for pity.
Got to the point where Mom avoided ever leaving me alone in public with Nancy because I’d come home and have an anxiety attack from the way strangers were treating me.
My mom, myself, and my youngest sister all look STRIKINGLY similar. My youngest sister and I also happen to be 10 years apart, so there were times in the store that my mom would leave me with her at the cart to get something, and I would get side eyed by so many people, but thankfully never got a rude comment because I was a super shy kid and I probably wouldn’t have been able to reply back to their negativity.
I got that stink eye SOOO much. I was 22 and married when I had my first child, 24 when I had my second. With my first, I was also working full time and going to night school. And it continued, for different reasons, up until about 2 years ago. But then – it was because I apparently looked like I was out with a much younger man.
I used to laugh when one of them would call me “mom” and these nosy nellies were embarrassed for their dirty minds.
One time when I was 19, I had just gotten a new job that required a drug test. I went to the center for the drug testing and was sitting quietly in the waiting room. There were two unattended kids in the waiting room, running around like crazy and making lots of noise. Eventually, the receptionist said to me in an annoyed voice, “Are those your kids??” I was like, “No!”
Lmao my high school boyfriend and I used to babysit his literal baby brother together. If we went anywhere with that baby we’d get the nastiest looks. I had one woman ask me why I had a kid with no ring! Like lady that would be none of your business even if that was my baby! They would change tunes so quickly if I corrected them about the situation. So rude and nasty
I’m 51 and let me tell you those older women who also grew up in the 70s and 80s have some pretty hefty skeletons in their closets and need to remember the drug addled weekend long raves their/my generation was notorious for.
Put your eyes back in your head, lady, I was there, I know you’ve done worse.
I bet you any money the same people don’t think abortion should be accessible and people who don’t want to be should be forced to be pregnant as well.
I had a similar experience–my mom had my half siblings starting when I was 13. When I was 15-16 taking my 2-3 year old sister everywhere, I regularly got dirty looks from old ladies. It’s such a wild assumption.
One of my brothers was born the summer before my senior year. I was not a cool kid and had only dated one guy until then and he had left town my sophomore year.
The amount of my friends and I think even teachers that thought he was my son that I had in secret and gave to my mom to raise disgusted me….
I have a sister 10 years younger than me and I remember taking her to a Halloween gig at her elementary school when she was 5 (i was 15). They had a cop there explaining how to safely trick or treat, sister’s witch hat kept falling off and he made a big show of saying “oh I’ll get that for you, mommay should be holding it” and hands ot to me with the most evil glare ever.
I am turning 30 and have a youngest brother who is 3, my partner and I take the younger boys to help my mom every other weekend (11 and 3) and i still get dirty looks (i look about 25 and partner looks about 30) for having 2 boys with me but my partner gets told he is such a sweet daddy….
Had my son when I was 25, a very VERY planned pregnancy. Could not figure out why everyone was giving me dirty looks when out with my newborn, why people said such horrible things about me, around me, instead of gushing over my new baby.
One day the truth came out: “honey, you look like you’re 12 years old.”
This. My little sister and I have an 15 year gap and everyone just assumed she was mine.
They also thought I was my dad’s barely legal wife and would openly comment on it like it was facts. I was like “no my mom is at home. This is not my kid. Please stop assuming.”
When taking my neice out, I told her she better start every sentence with “Auntie” because I wasn’t up for dealing with strangers bullshit…in more age appropriate wording.
All teen moms should copy your sister, just say they’re 30 to make the judgey people back off.
If they make a comment, just say “thank you! I do look young!” then walk away 😆
I’m sorry, wasn’t 18 the common age for conception for most of the elderly generation? Their mothers probably had them at 18/19
An acquaintance of mine has a saying. “Nunayabizness.” This is one of them. A person’s with a kid, a stranger doesn’t know who’s the kid’s parent nor how old the person with the kid is and it’s none of their business.
My baby sibling was 13 years younger than me. I was blown away when people thought they were mine. Heaven forbid a kid has an older sibling, aunt or uncle or some other relative or even a nanny or babysitter that takes them somewhere. Again, it’s nunayabizness!
Are you me? Except my sister was born just before I turned 14. Man did I get some crazy looks – thankfully no comments. I did get comments when I had my first (at 24) sadly. And my sister is the mom to 3 and looks really young. She gets comments too.
People just need to mind their own business. Even if that mom IS a teen mom, nobody has the right to glare or make comments.
When I was in high school, my brother and sister-in-law deployed. My niece came and lived with us. Sometimes after school I would take her to the park/store etc. the amount of nasty comments I got were astonishing. Every comment was from an older woman.
My older sister had her daughters in her twenties. I’ve looked young my whole life but especially in my teens/ twenties. The looks and comments I got while babysitting in public were shocking.
My favourite (?) was a relative of a friend who straight up tried to pretend they didn’t see me after making eye contact and a shocked look. So what if they were mine? No reason to get all judgmental- the children are already here, platitudes aren’t helping.
As it turned out, I never did have children of my own. Still love those girls though and happy to continue to be mistaken as their mom.
A friend who was mid 30s was approached in a parking lot by an older woman who literally finger wagged her saying “I don’t agree with teen pregnancy!” She just left…couldn’t be me. I’d have a few choice words to say back…
I’m going to do what you did. Just go up to an old lady who should know better and say, “She’s 30!” Just to wipe that look off of her face.
I don’t even have to know the people involved. I’m just gonna jump in and see what happens. Young women don’t deserve the horseshit istg.
I remember when I was 18, taking my friends nieces to an amusement park with him. His sister ( mother of the children) was much older and the kids were about 6 or 7. The horrified looks I got from people made me feel like I was doing something bad. A good reminder to never assume and don’t judge
I was harassed at a McDonalds while hanging out with my toddler cousin as a young teenager while her mom was in the bathroom. It happened again when I was an older teen with a different baby cousin. I’m 14 and 16 years older than them.
And does it matter, frankly?
I’ve been on more than one side of this- I was born when my mother was nearly 43. She didn’t have nearly enough spoons to take me to everything, my then 17yo sister took me to the baby health nurse.
That baby health nurse deliberately let me be exposed and let me get very cold.
When we got home my mother enquired and raised hell about it, stomping up there to rip the nurse a new one.
Part of her complaint was that why should a baby be punished even if my sister was my mother, which she wasn’t.
I became a teen mother myself. I was 18 and looked younger, the absolute judgemental looks I got were something.
I did what I did, glaring at me didn’t change it. Myself and my son grew to become productive members of society because of people who encouraged, not those who discouraged.
When I was in college I baby sat a lot to make extra money. This happened to me frequently at the playground. I always wanted to say “if this was my child, wouldn’t it be a little too late for the lecture at this point?”
My sibling is 15 years younger than me and of course when they were a baby / toddler I used to adore taking them out with me to the park and things.
The level of abuse and hatred you would get from older people was insane though.
I mean it’s also pretty wrong to judge teen moms considering nearly half of teen moms were knocked up by an adult and are therefore victims. It’s not a 19 and 20 year old situation either. The AVERAGE is 6.7 years older than them.
That teen mom is a girl who was groomed trying her best to live a life she probably never wanted.
I’m old enough that I remember my grandparents telling me about “oops” babies. Before reliable contraception, the Rhythm method worked kind of okay enough that you could avoid pregnancy by having sex on “safe” days and going for an illegal D&C early enough in the pregnancy (hopefully you survived). This worked with regular periods, for women in their 20’s and 30’s. It did not work when the woman began late perimenopause and periods became irregular. Fertile periods arrived unexpectedly and when periods were 4, 5, 7 months apart you often didn’t know you were pregnant until far too late in the pregnancy. So you’d see women in their 40’s with toddlers and knew exactly how they did their Family Planning (or, after oral birth control pills were made available, Catholic families such as in Ireland — Hello, Derry Girls!). Thus gaps of 15, 20, 25 years between children were not unusual After BC pills, this became much less common.
So these old biddies doing their glaring are too young to remember that Family Planning looks different for a lot of reasons, and to mind their own damn business.
The teenage mom should not be glared anyway
Just to add to the public service announcement …. A woman in their 40s with a kid in kindergarten isn’t always the grandmother either.
When I was 13, I would take my three-year-old cousin to the grocery store (it was within walking distance), and SO many people gave me dirty looks because they thought she was mine. Like, seriously?
My oldest sister and my youngest sibling have 12 years between them. So by the time the youngest was 2 or 3, my sister was 14-15. She would get nasty looks when they were out in public with my mom. People assumed my mom was grandma and my sister was her mom.
My mom’s method for correcting this was to, very loudly, ask my youngest sibling if they wanted mom or their sister to take them to the bathroom, help them with their food, etc. and make a big show of that person helping them
My cousin is 18 years older than her baby sister. She babysat a lot while mom worked ….LOTS of comments.
I looked young at 18/19, dating my wife who had a toddler. He looked enough like me that he could pass as mine. I got SO MANY looks!! I hated taking him out alone, even to the playground.
People itch for the chance to judge and condemn.
I have such a crisp memory of going to the Laundromat with my sister and her first born. I was 12 and she was 21.
I immediately clocked the whispers, the pointing, the slack jaws, frowns and nasty look…all directly solely at me, the child, when there was a grown ass woman with us whom the child could (and did) belong to.
But they assumed it was me because they wanted it to be me — so they could have something to be nasty about.
My youngest brother is 13 years younger than me and on the occasions that just my dad, littlest brother, and I would go somewhere, the looks were poison daggers. Very, very uncomfortable. People really need to adjust their attitudes and faces.
I had a situation like this in high school. I have endometriosis and at the time had an ovarian cyst the size of a lemon! Well one day my mom took me to the gynecologist to get an ultrasound of the cyst. The office was on the same street as my high school, which is a very well known fancy prep school. I was in my uniform with the school’s name on my sweatshirt, so there was no question that I was a teenager.
Well the ultrasound tech tried to scan me and said my bladder wasn’t full enough so sent me back to the waiting room to drink more water. I got so many nasty looks from the older women there! They just wrongly assumed I was pregnant! It made me even more anxious and upset than I already was.
Anyway, let’s remember to not be like that when we’re the old ladies!
My sisters are 12 and 15 years younger than I am. Once, while pushing them in a stroller at the mall, a middle-aged mother stared at me while loudly announcing to her son, “See her?! That’s why I told you to stay away from those little sluts at school!” And then walked past me and said “you should be ashamed of yourself!” in the loudest scream-whisper I’ve ever heard. I simply replied back, “for what?! Minding my own business and taking my sisters for a walk so my mom could rest?!” I’ve never seen someone turn purple faster. I hope that moment stuck with her, but I’m willing to bet she learned nothing. Yuck.
Oh man. I feel this so hard. My little brother is eight years younger but I was a tall kid and in charge of him a lot at my little sisters’ ball games and the mall. People were so nasty about me watching a kid. One time in MIDDLE school, I had the plastic home ec baby and my little brother at the playground. A lady sat down next to me and started being so extra about the corrupted morals of today’s kids (very obviously me). I just laughed and said “That’s my brother and this is a doll.” She turned red and left pretty quickly. Moron could have just said nothing.
Haha one time when I was 17 or 18 I went to a fair/festival type thing in my city with my similarly aged friend and her baby nephew (he was like 2.5 and in a stroller) that she was babysitting for her older sister. It was in a big park and had activities for people of all ages and there were tons of other kids. There was a shuttle bus from the parking area to the park and it was a little difficult to get the baby and his stroller on the bus and people were generally grumpy waiting in line for the shuttle but we made it work and it was fine. Some asshole on the bus just couldn’t help himself and said, “maybe you’d be having an easier time if you didn’t have a kid so young” Like somebody actually said that out loud to us 🙃 my friend told him off and he shut up, pretty sure he had his kids there too.
I remember when my sister and I would be babysitting our family friend’s kids and she always got the NASTIEST looks from old ladies because she was like 17-18 and we had two little ones. But also, they are mixed race, so she got the racism aspect too. It was oddly never directed towards me even though we’re close in age and I’m also a woman. Was always so strange, but my sister had no problem telling them to fuck off and mind their own business lol
How about people mind their fucking business regardless of how old anyone is?
Unfortunately approximately 0% of the type of older women you describe would ever, ever read this subreddit.
I appreciate this post though, its an excellent reminder to everyone to not be judgemental of strangers you don’t know a thing about and to leave them alone unless its to genuinely help someone in need.
My mom was 27 when she had me (her oldest) and got dirty looks and whispered comments from people during her pregnancy w me all the way to when she had my youngest sister 5 years later. It’s funny because she lived in Texas where it’s still very normal and accepted to start having kids at 20/21
Oh yeah, this was a while ago, but I’m 2 years older than my one sister and 14 years older than my other sister, when she was young the older sister and I were at the mall with the family, our parents were off somewhere so we were pushing the baby in the stroller.
We got the nastiest looks from pretty much any woman over the age of 40 who saw us. What was funnier, it didn’t even occur to us at the time WHY it was happening, until we mentioned it in the car on the way home and mom and dad started laughing.
I used to babysit my little brother and sister, I’d be in my high school uniform pushing a pram around going “OH I WONDER HOW YOUR MUMMY IS GOING, SHALL WE CHECK ON HER SOON?” And so on, just to stop the judgement.
People have been doing this FOREVER. My dad was a whoops baby, born in 1947 to my 43(?) year old grandmother. My aunt was 20 and when she helped out, she got judged hard-core until she married and had a wedding ring.
My sister is two and a half years older than I am. My brother is nine years younger than me and eleven and a half years younger than her. My sister always looked older than her age growing up, so people constantly assumed she was a teen mom when she was alone with him. It was awful.
But also—even if you ARE looking at at teenage mom, you shouldn’t be glaring at them and judging them. You’re looking at a child who is making her future much more difficult but taking care of her child, she doesn’t deserve judgment. I switched schools my last two years of high school, and I made sort-of friends with a girl in my class who had a baby. I let her cheat off my tests so she’d pass US History. This girl worked so hard. History definitely wasn’t her forte, but while I was just a random 16 year old, she was dealing with custody battles, a son who was showing early signs of autism, and a million other things that were so far removed from my reality I couldn’t fully comprehend it. She was doing her absolute best and just didn’t have the same amount of time to study most of her peers did. But she still graduated, and at her graduation, her hat said “Mommy did it [her son’s name].” I had only known her for two years, but I was so proud of her and it still upsets me how even on our graduation day some of my peers refused to say a kind word about her.
If I was forced against my will to relieve high school (please, may it never happen), I’d let her cheat off my tests all over again. Or, you know, maybe offer to tutor her so she wouldn’t have to cheat.
I was just thinking about this! I had a very similar experience. My brother and I have a big age gap, so I’m closer in age to two of his three kids than I am to him. If I was ever out with my mom and all three of them, it was fine, we just looked like spaced out siblings. But I hated going out with just my mom and the youngest one. People always assumed he was mine, and older ladies used to give me the most hateful looks.
Friend had her kids in her 40’s and complained people always assumed she was the grandmother. You seriously cannot win.
This happened to me a lot with my little brother. He and I were bonded and he wanted me to carry him everywhere. I had multiple women ask me in a very rude tone if that was my baby which is just crazy to me. I have never looked at a girl holding a baby and thought that at all, much less had the balls to act judgemental and stick my nose in someone’s business.
I mean, who gives a shit? Really, mind your business.
I was 12 years old when he was born and they all just assumed I was a teen mom. It sucked
Agree 💯 Same for folks who assume an older person with a child is grandparent. I’d add that nobody needs to judge or comment either way. Mind your own business!
I’m 34, but look much younger. Many people assume that my 13 year old daughter is my little sister. I’ve recently also started experiencing the horror that is older people assuming my husband is my dad(we’ve been together for 15 years, since Highschool, amd never had this peoblem until recently. He’s starting to show his age a little more than I am.)
I remember how frustrating it was to go anywhere by myself with any of my four kids when they were young, because I would get so many looks..the nurses also treated me poorly at the hospital with my 4th baby because they assumed he was my first and I “didn’t know what I was talking about” when I requested specific things. One actually asked said “this is your first, right?” And that’s when I figured out the problem.
Anyway, I agree with OP. Don’t make assumptions of you’re gonna use them as an excuse to be nasty towards people.
One of my older daughters says she always got dirty looks at the park when she was playing with her younger siblings!
I used to baby sit an 11 year old when I was 14. People assumed I was her mother. I asked if they really thought I gave birth at 3 years old.
Teen moms need our sympathy not bullshit.
I’m a 50+ woman and I think it’s effed up to give any mom a hard time.
My middle school friend had a sibling 12 years younger than her. She would always get weird looks when they went out alone together to the mall, so I knew starting from then not to judge.
Besides, even if you really are a teen mom, who am I to judge?
“Oh, I didn’t know she was [the older siblings/babysitting/an adult/whatthefuckever]”
You…knew she was a person? You could treat people with some basic respect and dignity? You could keep your judgy-ass comments to yourself maybe?
I absolutely hate these people. (Full disclosure I have a sibling 12 years younger than me and got a lot of hateful judginess in public throughout my teens and twenties)
When my nephew was a baby/toddler I got asked if I was his mother.
I was like 14 at the time, and looked very very 14. Not to mention I’m quite tan/dark ethnically ambiguous. With a white as paper child with flaming red hair. (Sister is a half sister, not mixed).
With that said no one said anything mean about it. I just got a lot of “is this your little guy?” And questions about baby products that I knew nothing about.
I’ve gotten rude comments from older women when out with my daughter, they mistook me for being younger than I actually am and backtracked when I told them my actual age. It’s so bizarre.
Lets be real, most of these women had children quite young
My step daughter and daughter are about 12 years apart and we went through this in Kentucky. When they were 16 and 4, people assumed this all the time.
One time my wife, step daughter and daughter were walking out of a store and some lady selling girl Scott cookies made the comment, “it’s sad to see a girl have a baby that young.” My wife equipped back, “They’re both mine.”
What was worse was me traveling with my kids. They would go in before me to get a table at a restaurant, and the hostess would be all smiles until I walked in. I would get the dirtiest looks. People’s minds always go to the worse thoughts.
This happened to my mom. My gran got unexpectedly pregnant at 45 and she nearly died during birth. My mom was 15 at the time and would often run errands with her baby brother and father while gran was recovering. Well of course my uncle looked like both my mom and grandfather so they got lots of dirty looks and rude comments, assuming he’d impregnated her I guess. Meanwhile, they were just glad my gran had survived.
When my sister was little, people asked me if I was her mother. The thing is she’s only 10 years younger than me. That means I would have given birth to her when I was 10. TEN.
I’m in my 30’s but everyone in my family looks much younger than they are, and I frequently get mistaken for a teenager, even by actual teenagers.
My brother is a decent chunk older than me, and has two young kids.
Whenever I take them out I get SO many nasty looks. Occasionally when someone refers to me as their mom and I correct them that in their aunt the person (usually a woman) will say something like “oh thank god! I thought you were one of those”.
Always get the ick from those interactions
It’s crazy how much shit teen moms get in your side of the world.
I live in Singapore. I had my son when I was a VERY young-looking 28, and I had people mistaking me for a teen mom a lot. Everyone was really sweet to me, though my ex-husband didn’t like being seen with me because people would give him the dirty looks thinking he knocked up a teenager.
On the flip side, my friend is 48 with a three year old little sister from her dad 🫣 the comments of being too old to have a baby came from people too. We should just all stop judging because you never know. Hell they could be babysitting the kid for all we know.
My mom had twins when I was 11 (which was 32 years ago). I don’t remember why, but at a certain point my dad and I were in an elevator in the hospital with each one of us holding a baby. An older lady looked at me and asked if that was my baby. Being 11, it didn’t occur to me what she meant, so I said yes. She called me disgusting when the door opened and just walked away.
People used to give me shit and nasty looks when I would take my little brothers out in public. We’re talking an 18 year old with a 10 year old and an 8 year old. How could I possibly be their parent??? Come on!
Why are people like this? Why, when you see two strangers spending time together, do you make assumptions about what kind of relationship they have?
When I spend time with my dad, it is often one-on-one. My parents are divorced, and we also just like doing the same kinds of things so we do those things together. He had me when he was 40, and therefore our age gap is even bigger than the average–any sane person looking at him would assume he is father age to me and not significant other age.
And yet I constantly get dirty looks, and he gets really embarrassed and always feels like he has to explain. He now makes an effort to say “my daughter” in reference to half the things he says to people: “my daughter is ready to order” “my daughter is really excited to see this” “this is the third hike my daughter and I have gone on in this region” etc.
Like, can we just exist? It’s incredibly annoying that it’s constantly a thing. And it just feels gross to know people are looking at you that way when it’s your fucking DAD.
It’s always so funny to me how people behave. I’ve been a nanny for a very long time, over 20 years. In my mid 20s I was caring for an infant. Whenever we went out in public if I was wearing my engagement ring people were nice to us. If I’d forgotten to put it back on people were awful.
I get I look much younger than I am, but I’m officially middle aged and people still suck.
Even now I’m over 40, and nanny 3 toddlers. The grief total strangers give me about how many kids I have (3 separate families in a nanny share, none of the kids look alike) is astonishing. Sometimes I make up elaborate back stories if I’m feeling it. Oh, I don’t know who their dad is, this woman dropped her off at my house six months ago and we haven’t heard a word since to wait, you need a baby daddy? Sometimes I retort “triplets can be different races?” (My kiddos are different races, although they think they’re exactly the same because “we all have dark hair”).
My older sister was a senior in high school when I was born. It never occurred to me before whether or not she was ever mistaken for my mother when I was young. I’ll have to ask her. Ironically though, it was our mother who was the actual teen mom. I’ve always thought she must’ve weathered it pretty well since she’s never indicated otherwise, but now I wonder if she ever got those looks from strangers.
I was 23 when I was pregnant with my son, and I remember one time this middle aged woman gave me a dirty look. I also wasn’t wearing my wedding ring because my fingers had swollen a bit. I just gave her a dirty look back, like “WTF is your problem, bitch?” I guess I looked like a young unmarried slut to her or some shit.
We were young parents and are young grandparents but there’s still that fucking double standard. However, now I’m old enough that I’m too damn tired and out of fucks to give. Before it bothered me, now I’m more like, Yeah, I’m a grandma, so what?! Fuck me, I’m tired
Totally I am 41 and I went to a family party the other day where a friend of my Dad’s cousin was there and when I was offered wine they gave me a funny look and they gave my Dad’s cousin a funny look and my mom says oh no he’s of age he’s 41 and they went oh wow he looks like he’s about 15.
For some reason people feel super-comfortable now about not minding their own business.
This happened to me when I was 16, I was sitting with my whole family in a mall food court with my baby nephew next to me in his stroller and some elderly women kept giving me the stank eye. I was surrounded by my entire family🤨
My sister was only a couple years older than me so I imagine she had to deal with that a lot.
I can’t go anywhere with my niece or nephew without people automatically assuming that they’re mine, not that I get the judgemental looks since I’m visibly not that young anymore. Any woman out with any child tends to be assumed to be the mother.
My nephew had a teething necklace when he was a toddler and some woman working at a store got abnormally upset when I couldn’t answer questions about it because he wasn’t my kid and I didn’t know if it helped. That just wasn’t a thing I discussed with my sister.
Between those sorts of interactions and the overwhelming number of people assuming that me and my dad were a couple whenever we went anywhere together, I’ve just stopped thinking about how other people are related. Good chance I’d be wrong and I don’t want to be that weirdo making people uncomfortable.
I remember taking my cousins to a park of some kind. I was a teen, they were toddlers. The three of us looked nothing alike, and I remember getting a lot of looks like they couldn’t figure if they should be mad that I must be a teen mom of kids with different dads or a good babysitter.
I got this a lot too as the oldest child of three. I also had a pretty big chest which runs in the family. I’d literally be out at dinner with my whole family and I’d have whole families staring at me if I took my younger sister (10 years apart) to the bathroom. First time I noticed it I was 13. People are friggin wild.
I once got asked how far along I was on my pregnancy with my little sister on my hip. I wasn’t pregnant.
I was 18, 17 when I got pregnant, but looked younger when I had my son, I got constantly stared at or comments, when I was wearing him in his carrier or breastfeeding him in public, because those things made me more obviously his mom. The thing is, I didn’t look like they expected a “teen mom” to look like. So people pretty much always thought I was the sister/aunt until he called me mom and people were always extremely surprised and constantly told me that I don’t look like a teen mom, which was just weird in itself. I had several times happened that I met people at the university or somewhere without kiddo and they wouldn’t believe me that I had a child. Because people have such extreme prejudices of teen moms.
His father got loved by everyone, for doing less than the bare minimum and I honestly hate it to this day. I got severely ill recently and he was forced to take more care of him, well mainly his wife did, but he wrote an essay at a course he’s taking about how they got close the last year, you know he only needed 15 years to really bond with his child but got endless praise whenever he did anything with him, well he also wasn’t a teenager, he was 22. The main cause for teen pregnancy, adult men.. Now he’s getting a sibling from his dad side and they’ll have a near 16 year age gap, it will be interesting to see how people will react.
At 14, I was toting around my youngest sister and my cousin who is a year younger but about the same size at 2 & 3 years…
Yes these two that call me “sissy” are my kids… bc kids usually call their mom “sissy”…
Definitely gave me a hard shell when I became a mom at 18.
My mom loved taking us shopping so off to the mall we went, and we decided to go for lunch at one of the restaurants. As babies do, he got hungry, so I nursed him (covered), and a lady a table over started having a fit and told the waitress to say something. Another older woman and her husband spoke up with “ABSOLUTELY NOT! She is doing something that is normal!”
My mom and I, of course, thanked them. It’s been over 20 years, and I still think about that couple standing up for me 💛
I’m a 36 year old mom of a 3 year old and I look like I’m 12 lol, teenage family members have told me they think they look older than me 😂 I’m sure there are old people who judge me for being a teen mom, but I’m too old to give a shit about what strangers think of me.
Yes, older women 50’s, 60’s and up need to mind their own business! SO many older women when they find out I don’t have kids (because they ask?!) say something along the lines of “oh you’re young there’s still time” I’m 40, have Endo one ovary and don’t actually want kids- telling them that shuts them up, but I’m so sick of the conversation!
My parents owned a store that I worked in for awhile. One time a customer went up to my mom to tell her about the young blind my father was talking to.
Another time I ran into my father at the bank. I hadn’t seen him in several days and gave him a hug. Mine is a family of buggers.
The glares I got from sone of the other customers was disturbing. This was about 40 years ago. I don’t remember if said anything to them.
As for teens who really are moms, a little support wouldn’t go amiss.
My parents owned a store that I worked in for awhile. One time a customer went up to my mom to tell her about the young blind my father was talking to.
Another time I ran into my father at the bank. I hadn’t seen him in several days and gave him a hug. Mine is a family of buggers.
The glares I got from sone of the other customers was disturbing. This was about 40 years ago. I don’t remember if said anything to them.
As for teens who really are moms, a little support wouldn’t go amiss.
I really think these types of situations are due to the economic circumstances of the world. Millennials are not having as many kids (or no kids at all). They also cannot afford the milestones that have traditionally signalled adulthood. I think this has a big part in the ageism that a lot of people (even people in their 30s and 40s) are facing.
These circumstances have skewed what real life looks like to people looking in.
I’m having a similar experience as a ‘young’ homeowner. I just recently moved into a condo that I bought with my partner. We are both in our 30’s. I’m 35 y’all and I have already gotten a few comments from some more senior residents in my building. A few have outright said they don’t like ‘young people’ living in their building. And someone even told my partner that “This building was better when younger people weren’t living here”.
This building has NEVER been an adult only community. And I’m turning 36 this year…I’ve been in my field of work for almost 15 years and I am being treated this way. I bought this place, and this is how I am treated by other people who live here. They are so nasty about it. But I don’t take it. I bought this place and they are welcome to move out if they don’t like it.
My partner actually asked the one lady what she meant by “Young people” and she said 20. 20. She doesn’t even know!!!!!!
Personally I don’t think anyone should be treated poorly for how young someone assumes you are. But plenty of people do. I’m so sorry your sister is dealing with this!
There is literally nothing she could do which wouldn’t get her judgement. If she didn’t have kids, that would somehow be a problem. Having kids is also a problem. Some people will always find a way to pick apart other people’s lives.
Figure out something to snap back with and push back on their bs.
I took a parenting class when I was 17 and it involved caring for a realistic robot baby. It had all theses sensors and fake cried. I had it for 24 hours, it mostly sat in the car seat. From a distance it looked like a real baby.
My family and I went to dinner at a cheap chain restaurant and the amount of glares I got was staggering. Especially when I had to feed the baby from it’s “bottle”. I had to keep my mother from confronting another table of older women.
The glares I got stuck with me as much as the experience of sitting on my bathroom floor begging a fake baby to stop crying for 2 hours at 3AM.
But hey, I got a 100% on the assignment, and I ended up working as an infant teacher for a while.
If this shit happens to anyone just make up a story so they feel guilty
When I was 16 I was the sole caretaker of my little sister because our bio mom is a meth addict, and there were no other options at the time. I’m blind, so I can’t say much about nasty looks but oof the amount of nasty comments I got was insane. I was already stressed enough but I barely wanted to go outside and got pretty suicidal.
(My aunt adopted her eventually. She is happy and healthy, and I still have regular contact with her)
On a lighter note, someone made some comment about me having kids at my age fairly recently. Pulling a rat out of a stroller in response was quite fun.
Don’t people consider a young person might be a babysitter or nanny?
When I was a kid, I was at a summer day camp. We were walking around town on a scavenger hunt, five of us under 10, and our camp councillor who would’ve been maybe 17 at the time. We were talking with her about something, when we see this older guy slowly drive by, absolutely gawking at us all. He pulls over and jumps out of his truck, then walks down the sidewalk towards us. He kinda stares at the group of us for a second, then looks at the councillor and starts grilling her about if we’re all hers, and if we have the same dad etc.
She was rightfully taken aback for a second before gesturing to her shirt and clarifying that this was a summer camp, and she was about to start Grade 12. At the time we thought it was kinda funny-kinda weird, but looking back as an adult, I cannot fathom how that grown-ass man thought that was an appropriate reaction to seeing a teenage girl doing her job.
It’s a US thing because nobody cares here in the UK
There was a classmate in high school who was 15. This was in 1977. Her parents adopted two babies. She was sitting in the park with the babies while her mother was taking a walk. She got some looks from some older women. As her mother was walking she overheard these women talking about seeing this young woman who had twins and how she is probably on welfare which is a burden to the system. Her mom realized that these women were talking about my friends, so she set them straight. They were then relieved as at least her daughter wasn’t a teen mom.
My classmates was constantly mistaken for being the mother of the babies.
>”a little young to be having children don’t you think?”
“you’re a little young to be acting senile, don’t you think?”
At twelve, watching my toddler nephew in a store a couple aisles over from my mom and 23 year old sister I was called a “whore” who “needed to keep my legs closed.” This was by an older lady in front of my toddler nephew.
I actually didn’t understand what it meant to keep your legs closed until I was much older. I was naive at twelve and knew babies came from a mom’s stomach but had no idea how they got in there.
My mother was apoplectic, followed the old lady to her car and stood in front of the woman’s parked car until she got out and apologized to me.
My mom was the queen of pissed off and when people walked by staring she implied the woman had tried to kidnap me for trafficking-which I also didn’t completely understand until I was much older.
Shocked the cops weren’t called, before cell phones I guess.
My mom was 28 when she had me and was blessed with very very good genes. She’s told me that doctors tried to lecture her on teen pregnancy and she would get dirty looks when maternity shopping or just being visibly pregnant. Granted I have seen pictures and she looked 14-16 at that age but keep your looks and lectures to yourselves even if someone is pregnant at that age, shits gonna be hard enough for them as is.
Anyway I hope that doctor thinks about that interaction from time to time and still feels bad.
I have a family member who got pregnant in high school and married the guy. Everything worked out fine.
But even in our family, it’s like she’s viewed as having made a mistake but made the best of it, and he’s viewed as a literal hero with angel wings because he stuck around. They both had the sex that created the baby, and both raised it.
What I don’t understand is the anger at teen moms when they should be angry at the much older adult men who raped them. Statistics show only a small percent of underage moms have babydaddies close to their own age. It’s usually guys in their 30s.