I grew up in a home where we referred to our mother as Mommy or Mom. My husband and his siblings called their mother Mummy (Mum). I've noticed a lot of Brits use the term Mum. My own 2 little boys usually call me Mama. What term do you use in your family?

My sister and I call our mother 'Amma', which is extremely common among south Indian families - even though my mother isn't south Indian, my father is.

'Mum' is the Aussie term, and 'mummy' is the pre-school word. When I read American comics, I presumed that 'Mom/mommy' was a typo!

No typo. Here it's mom (or mommy for the younger set).

I always called my mother "mom." I don't remember ever calling her "mommy," though I know a lot of people who did when they were younger. Sometimes if I'm feeling cheeky, I call her "mum" or "mother" and when we worked together I called her by her first name. I still call my dad "Daddy" though, but that's because I'm a Daddy's Little Girl.

My husband refers to me as "mama" when talking with my daughter. (As in "Go see your mama" or "Go give that to Mama.") I'll probably be "Mama" until she's old enough to think that is baby-ish, and then I'll be "Mom" like my mother. And, like my father, my husband will probably always be "Daddy" to his little girl. I never really pictured myself as a "Mama" rather than the other options, but one of my friends used to call me a "Hot Tamale Mama" so I suppose it fits...

In the US South, it's common (at least in my parents' generation) to use the terms "mother and daddy" - even as adults.

It seems that we live on a Mommy/Mummy fault line. Our children have always called Mrs Stew mummy (more recently mum as they have got a little older), but for quite a few of their friends (generally those with the strongest Birmingham accents) it's mommy.

Daddy/dad seems to be a constant though, so at least I know where I stand.

You mean, it's not "mummy and duddy"?

It's duddy at the moment actually Linda, as both have streaming colds!

I still sometimes will refer to my father as Daddy. I guess girls are able to get away with it well into adulthood Occasionally myself or one of my siblings will call him Pops. My mother jokingly calls Dad the "Old Slipper" as he is such an old softie:)

When I was younger and couldn't get Mom's attention I'd resort to a loud "Mother" or Rose, her given name. That usually generated a response.

I call my parents "mom and daddy". When speaking about my mother, I will use the term mom or mother. But when I talk to her, it's usually "mama". But I call my father "daddy" all the time.

I call my mother "Ma" and my father "Baba".

Simple "Mum" and "Dad" for me!

I call my parents Mom and Dad. When I was little it was Mommy and Daddy. My mom would love for me to call her "mommy" still, but I always say I'm too old!

Being a Brit it is Mum and Dad, or Mummy and Daddy when young.

In Britain the class factor also enters here, in the upper classes it is normal for females to call their parent Mummy and Daddy when they are adults, men are likely to use Mother and Father or Ma and Pa or even Mater and Pater.

My daughter calls me Mumsy, Mum or Mother depending on her mood.

It’s always been Mum and Dad for me and most of my southern English contemporaries.

I was interested to see Stew saying that Mom is heard around Birmingham. I’ve never heard it down south. For us, “mom” is like “sidewalk” or “elevator”: it’s a word that strikes us as quintessentially American.

In some parts of the UK the dominant form for mother used to be “Mam” or “Mammy.” I believe this can still be heard in Wales (not surprisingly, since the Welsh for mother is “mam”).

I fear that to my Dutch ears "mum" and "mom" sound similar. Could anyone write them down phonetically?

Mum would sound like the word, ummmm, come (or ummmmm, come to think of it! )

Mom would sound like Tom.

I'll try Leau

Mum is said the same as Hum
Mom is said the same as Bomb (sorry can't think of another word!)
My own mother was always my "Mam" (said the same as Jam) just to add confusion to the discussion. (to be strictly honest my parents were (and I still refer to them as)"Me Mam and Me Dad") but then I live in the Midlands of England where there is hardly any use of the English Language whatsoever

Edit : There was recently a national news item that said the English Language was born around Leicester - hard to beleive when 99.999% of English speaking people don't understand the dialect

Seems like I'm a loner here as I always called my mother 'Mammy' when young, and "Mam" as an adult. My father was "Daddy" and is now "Dad".

My own children call me "Mammy", which causes laughter here, as in France this is the word reserved for Grandmothers. My toddler still isn't able to manage a fully-fledged Mammy or Mummy, and I am his (and only his) "Momma" (He's not in a sharing mood when it comes to his mother). They call their father "Daddy" (Dah-Dah from the toddler) when talking about him to me, and "Papa" when talking to him.

Slightly off topic, they call their grandfather "Grandy", which seems to be an invention of their own. Anyone else ever had a "Grandy" in the family?

The children in our family call their maternal grandparents Grampy and Nanny and their paternal grandparents Grandad and Nanny. One of my neices, when a toddler, called her grandfather "Bumpy"........no Grandy's though!

Along those same lines, my paternal grandparents were Grandmother and Granddad while my maternal grandparents were Grandma and Papa. Great-Grandparents were shortened to GGMa and GGPa (pronounced gee-gee).

I'm seeing a bit of "accent drift" in my own family. My mother called HER mother "Mama" (Mumma), I called my mother "Mum", and my own children call me "Mom". I assume this has something to do with the amount of American television and movies that they watch. My husband also calls his mother "Mum". We of course also watched American TV when we were kids, but at that time there were only two channels in our city, so most of the time there was nothing on that a kid would want to watch. Different situation now!

In Australia, it is Mum or Mummy. However, because of the influence of television, we are aware that Americans use Mom and Mommy.

Some of my daughter's friends, who regard me as their second mother, call me "Mrs Mum".

Ooh, something I forgot: when I'm irritated with my mother I call her "Mother". Usually this is when she's teasing me and I'm not taking it well! It's all in good fun though!