How I became my mum's dating coach.

When this writer’s mother found herself suddenly single at 61, she turned to her daughter for advice. And that advice led to a crash course in online dating.

Two years ago, when my 61-year-old mother called me in tears to announce that my stepdad wanted out of their 18-year marriage, I did the only thing I could think of to make her feel better: I found a pretty picture of her in a lavender satin dress and wrote her a Match.com dating profile. My three brothers and I hoped she’d find a nice guy who’d watch The Voice with her and rave about her Brussels sprouts.

We were completely unprepared for the feeding frenzy that followed.

Dozens of men responded, and my mum had a steady stream of suitors — at one point juggling four. It was awesome to see her happy again: hiding one man’s flowers under the sink before another one rang the doorbell; making Eagles CDs to go on cruising dates down the coast; sending me texts, such as “OMG! I just rode a Harley for the first time.”

My mum and I have always been close, and I loved my new role as her dating coach. I imparted all the romantic advice I’d read on the Internet about how to talk to a man about exclusivity and whether to consider a widower who’d lived alone for the past decade as a good bet for marriage. I persuaded her to trade in her boxy black sweaters for lacy camisoles, although she insisted on keeping her tall black boots. (“The boys love the boots,” she said.)

When she lamented about what to do about her greys “down there,” I told her about Brazilians.

Then it got awkward. Sometimes we forgot we were mother and daughter, and conversations ambled into TMI discussions about safe sex and Viagra. Let's just say that relationship expert Iris Krasnow got it right in her new book Sex After...: Women Share How Intimacy Changes as Life Changes when she revealed that our baby-boomer parents are having a pretty good time out there.

As baby-boomers flock to online dating in light of soaring divorce rates that have doubled for people over 50 in the last two decades, their adult children are experiencing an unprecedented role reversal. The number of members over 50 on Match.com has grown 90 percent over the last five years, and a recent US report found that six percent of all people ages 55 to 64 have used online dating.

“People talk about mothering their mothers, but in this case we’re actually daughter-ing our mothers. It’s an aspect of mum-daughter relationships to educate her about things she might not know about, such as how to text or use Facebook or in this case, online dating,” explains Deborah Tannen, Ph.D, professor of linguistics from Georgetown University and author of You’re Wearing THAT? Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation. “But there’s always a question of how close you want to be without feeling uncomfortable.”

Adult children are suddenly dealing with their mums meeting a flurry of potential partners. Besides getting used to the idea of calling before stopping by Nana’s house these days, they’re wrestling with what to tell their grandkids about her new “friends.” Then there are concerns about her well-being — from questions about whether it’s safe for her to accept a second date at Frank’s house for dinner to more poignant matters about who will take care of her when she gets old.

Our parents aren’t sure what to make of this new role reversal, either. My mum, for example, isn’t always happy with her kids in her business.

She’s got a serious boyfriend now, and I tease her about rushing me to the airport after visits home so she can resume her dating schedule. “Oh, stop it!” she says, laughing. There are fewer sex over-shares, which is how we both like it.

Still, I’ll take any temporary discomfort to help her find love again. We daughters may think we know it all about the modern rules of dating, but our mothers still have a lot to teach us about the timeless art of putting your heart on the line again at any age.

This post was originally published here and published with full permission.

Would you be happy helping your mother to Internet date?  What dating advice would you give her?