Mummy dearest: Help! I'm turning into my mother

0 Comments | Sunday Mirror, Mar 10, 2002 | by WORDS: DENNA BOWMAN

Carolyn Simon, 38, a full-time mum and part-time horticulture and garden design student from Northwood, Middlesex, is married to Andy, a police officer. They have a four-year-old daughter Tamzin. Carolyn believes that since she became a mum herself, she is definitely turning into her own mother, 67-year-old Patricia Howarth, a housewife from Pinner, Middlesex.

It is only since I've become a mother that I've noticed how similar me and my mum are - though when I was growing up I saw myself as a daddy's girl and thought I took after him rather than mum.

I first noticed this worrying trend when I started to borrow my mum's clothes - casual stuff I wouldn't have been seen dead in a few years ago. I now wear it all the time because it's so comfy. My mum's always been quite fashionable and well-dressed, but our tastes used to be very different. When I was younger, I hated it when she'd make my clothes and I always wanted shop-bought clothes. But now, like her, I enjoy dressmaking, and I even made my wedding dress and all the bridesmaid dresses.

Our taste in decor is getting similar too. I used to want to paint walls bright purple, but I now find myself admiring her new curtains or carpet and asking where she got them.

When I was little we were always close. I'm the eldest and the only daughter and I loved copying her and helping her. But, inevitably, we grew further apart when I started to rebel when I was a teenager.

My mum was a stay-at-home mum and she was always there when we got home from school. But I never wanted children and was always ambitious, first with hairdressing then with a career in setting up live events for television.

But since I've had Tamzin I realise that what mum did for us as children was brilliant and I wanted to be there for Tamzin, too.

My mum was very patient and, although it doesn't come naturally to me, I always try to find time to give Tamzin my undivided attention - so in some ways I'm deliberately trying to be like mum.

But the funniest thing is that my mum turned into her mum when she became a grandma. Our gran lived with us and would always give us sweets before mealtimes - and that would drive my mum mad. But now my mother does that with Tamzin given half the chance. As she's got older, my mum has become less inhibited - I watch her and Tamzin skipping off down the street singing "Fifteen men on a dead man's chest, yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum."

I have asked mum for advice on bringing up Tamzin and I've used the same games to persuade Tamzin to eat that mum used with me.

There are lots of other little things that used to annoy me about her that I now do myself. I could never understand why she'd save tea bags and little bits of peel in a pot by the sink for the compost heap. I'd think: "Why are you bothering? How can you even remember to do that?" Now, of course, I'm an extremely keen gardener - so I do the same thing.

I think it takes becoming a mum yourself to really understand your own mum and her little foibles. But I have to say, I still draw the line at sensible driving shoes or wearing orthopaedic open-toed sandals.

10 THINGS YOU SWORE YOU'D NEVER SAY...

1 "Gosh, this set of assorted Tupperware containers is so useful."

2 "If you swallow the pips a grape tree will grow in your tummy."

3 "I don't know why I bother..." followed by a heavy sigh and said at least five times a day to husband, child, anyone who'll listen...

4 To your teenage daughter: "You're not going out looking like that!" or "Don't forget your jacket, it's a bit chilly out tonight."

5 "Now, let's see who can clear their plate first."

6 "It's a lovely day - why don't you go out in the garden instead of hanging around inside all day?"

7 "Because I said so, that's why!"

8 "Why don't you go and read an interesting book instead of watching this old rubbish?"

9 "This room looks like a bomb's hit it."

10 (On watching Top Of The Pops) "What is he/she wearing?"

1 Collect money-off coupons and fumble about in your purse for them at the supermarket, much to the annoyance of the 20 people queuing behind you.

2 Have an assortment of small toys and sweets in your bag instead of lipsticks, phone numbers and a bottle opener.

3 Boil dish clothes in pans of water instead of just throwing them away.

4 Go shopping to buy yourself something, but come back with something for your child.

5 Keep every carrier bag that comes into the house.

6 Stop bothering to put make-up on when you pop to the shops.

7 Put your arm out to protect your passenger when you brake hard in the car.

8 Wonder why your children cringe when you say nice things about them to other people.

9 Suddenly understand that you only annoy your kids by saying no because you love them.

10 Start to collect elastic bands and useful bits of string.

10 THINGS YOU SWORE YOU'D NEVER DO...

Annette Stribling, 42, a manager for Weight Watchers postal services, lives in Oxford. She has three sons, John, 19, Daniel, 15, and Curtis, five. Her mum Lily, 65, lives six doors away.

My eldest son, John, has just bought a pair of designer Moschino jeans - I nearly died when he told me they cost pounds 140. I heard myself saying: "Why on earth did you spend that much money, when you could have got a perfectly good pair from Next for pounds 30?" Words straight from my mother's mouth.