All the things our mum taught us that we forget to say thank you for

If you’re a young adult, the chance is you’ve spent most of your life arguing with and/or moaning about your mum.

But the older you get, the more it becomes apparent: not only is she a good influence, your mother may actually be the only thing stopping you self-destruct like the human timebomb that you are.

So this one’s for the mums – thanks for the guidance you’ve given us, and the guidance you’re yet to give.

Literally knowing how to get every stain out of anything

Even if you’ve managed to cover a pair of blinding white jeans in molten hot tar, your mum will still have some convenient old trick with which to remove it. And yes, it will involve baking soda.

Teaching you to do stuff for yourself

You used to hate that she’d never make you a cup of tea when you asked, book you a doctors’ appointment or do the laundry. But it actually made you put in the effort to do things for yourself, so it was less hard when you actually left and went to uni.

For always being your biggest (well, only) fan

Yep, I may have lagged about 300m behind in the race on school sports day, and the rest of the kids and their parents may already have been traipsing inside by the time I had laboured to the finish line, but guess who was still watching and cheering politely? Good old mum.

Making you walk everywhere

I know I could be very demanding with the amount of lifts I expected, but if you hadn’t had a pretty solid ability to shoot me down and weather my following tantrums, I’d be getting a six minute Uber every time I fancied popping over to my mate’s house.

Ruining certain foods for you forever

Nope, not ordering the lasagne. Don’t care if it’s good. It could be Michelin Starred but I mean… it’s not my mum’s, is it?

Being much better at judging your exes than you

In hindsight it’s fairly obvious that one was a cheater, and that other one wasn’t really going anywhere, and the one that used to pull your dog’s hair was probably a psychopath. But back then her banning you from seeing them just made you want to see them more.

Recognising you were an annoying teenager

There was the time I bought the red skinny jeans and put them in a white wash, or the time I first got drunk and ended up throwing up on the hallway carpet and then crying.

You would yell at me, and I’d think you were being unreasonable. If I could meet my younger self now, I’d probably yell even louder at me.

Teaching you the consequences of your actions

I never really got told off when I was young, and my mum never said she was disappointed in me either – apart from one or two really bad occasions.

Instead, I’d be put to bed, then woken up when she’d calmed down, and we discussed my actions and the consequences of them. It made me think of the bigger picture, of other people’s feelings and of the knock on effect of everything.

Making you go to the dentist

Sitting in that chair was the bane of your entire life, and even the free lollipop at the end couldn’t make up for the absolute betrayal of being told “this won’t hurt.”

To be fair, though, you still have all your teeth – so it was probably a good idea. The same goes for making us get haircuts, see opticians and actually put suncream on on holiday.

Thinking you were beautiful when you were a really unfortunate-looking child

Although you did take me to the barbers’ to get that bowl haircut by choice, so you’re not 100 per cent innocent.

Giving you enough freedom

When you get to uni, you can always tell the ones that had really strict parents. They go absolutely mental on the first week, getting paralytic and sleeping with everyone they meet.

Putting you in your place when you threw strops

When I was an angsty teenager I thought there was nothing better at proving my point than trashing my room. They always did it in movies, Avril Lavigne seemed to swear by it.

When I did it though, my mum just stood in the doorframe after I finished and raised her eyebrows. “It’s your room you know, you’ve just messed up your own stuff. I’m not gonna clean it up, you are.”

Suddenly I felt very silly. I’d like to think that made me a less stroppy teenager (and more of a stroppy adult when she’s not around to check up on me).

Stopping you from bleaching your hair

You were right, you can’t go from black to beachy blonde without a really awkward period of being ginger. I’m sorry I did it anyway.

Being my sensible counterpart

Because you knew when I acted out and decided I wanted to go to university in Guam that I was making the wrong call (or Liverpool Hope, which is probably worse than Guam).

From loving children Bobby Palmer, Roisin Lanigan, Tom Jenkin and Daisy Bernard