When it comes to parenthood, there are plenty of opportunities for awkward encounters — whether it’s with other kids, fellow parents, or even teachers at school. This is especially true for parents who don’t necessarily look their age. “No, I’m Mom not Grandma,” or “Yes, I’m so-and-so’s mom, not his sister,” can be embarrassing for everyone involved.
A mom on Reddit takes the cake in the mistaken age award category. Not only was she clocked by another adult as being much younger than she is, but a teacher at her teen son’s high school also thought she was a literal student and gave her a detention for not having a hall pass. Yes, for real.
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A mom showed up for a parent-teacher conference for her high school son.
“I'm normally not very active at his school, I work multiple jobs. It's a huge school so I don't know all the staff,” the person shared in Reddit's r/OlderThanYouThinkIAm subreddit.
The mom explained that she and her son ate breakfast together in the quad and then waited outside the meeting room for his teachers after her teenager went to class.
Everything was going smoothly until a school staff member approached her.
“They stop, look at me, ask me where I'm supposed to be right now. I say, ‘I’m waiting for (teachers’ names).’ He asks for my pass,” the Redditor recounted.
“Now I'm assuming he's talking about a visitor’s pass, when I checked in at the office I was not given anything. So I said, ‘I don't have one. Was I supposed to be given one? I can head down to the office and grab it.’”
The staff member proceeded to send her to the office.
After the staff member asked her full name, he jotted something down on a pad of paper, handed the mom a carbon copy, and instructed her to head to the office.
“I just figured it was a temp pass or something like that,” the Redditor explained. “So I just quickly jog over to the office thinking I had to check back in, maybe the office staff was supposed to give me a visitor badge or pass of some kind.”
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At the office, the mom learned the school employee had given her a detention.
When the mom arrived at the office, she handed the employee her slip of paper. The employee appeared to be “incredibly confused” at first and then started laughing, the original poster recounted.
“He gave me an infraction!” she shared. “For being tardy and out of class! Apparently, he sent me to the office for detention for the rest of the period.”
In the end, everyone had a good laugh — but still, it was awkward.
When the mom explained to the teachers why she was late to the conference, they thought it was “hilarious.”
“They even called down to the staff member who had written me the infraction to jokingly tell him he can't send parents to detention or else they'll never get their parent meetings done on time,” she shared.
Still, though, how awkward for this mom of a teenager?
Folks in the comments chimed in with their own stories of mistaken ages.
One person, a 35-year-old teacher at a large high school, mentioned still being asked for passes “with surprising regularity.” As the person explained, “It’s legitimately hard to know sometimes because there’s 18-20 year olds who can pass for mid-twenties AND people in their 30s that can pass for the same. Always hilarious though!”
Another Redditor, also 35, declared, it’s “all just part of looking young,” adding, “We had an incident once where someone thought my wife was my mom and my kids were my siblings. That guy was lucky to see the next day as I thought she was going to jail for sure.”
“My best friend, (21 F 5’1”) was a new teacher in elementary school working the playground, when an older teacher asked her why she wasn’t participating in recess," someone else wrote. “She looked at her confused and said ‘because I’m supervising my students.’ About 10 years later she was the AP at that school.”
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
