Teen Boy Concerned About Height (lack of)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH... grew a foot over a summer (plus a bit).

I've read/heard about such growth every now and then, yet on the tanners scale the PHV is 3.5 inches over a year+. To grow a foot+ in three months must've been such an outlier - like one in a million maybe?

on the other hand I suppose kids shoot up in summer because they go outside more and have regular meals and sleep in a lot?

Those kinds of graphs are averages. While this happened to my DH (it was longer than 3 months, but a lot was in the summer), and I'm sure others, it's probably not the norm to grow that much over such a short time. It's probably more genetic when that happens.

Typically, I find that kids follow their parents in terms of puberty (late vs early) absent other issues. I don't think our DS will be super tall. He will be lucky if he is 5'10 since I am super short (5'), but when puberty will hit, and therefore the growth spurt, seems to follow the parents' patterns.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's no point in borrowing trouble and worrying about this now. What will be, will be.

I agree. Help him accept and love who he is now. Growth hormones, hanging every night, and pumping him full of meat and milk in the hope that he might get one more inch sends him the message that his health doesn't matter and that he is not good enough the way he is. ( In addition to the physical and psychological effects of all that!)

In the real world, as adults, height does not affect your life re: employment and success. And as for a partner, there is a lid for every pot.

x1000. I wouldn't indulge this very much. A few minutes of sympathetic listening to worries, then shut it down. Your message should be: We don't know what will happen, so there's no use worrying about this, especially as there is absolutely nothing to worry about here--there is nothing wrong with being 5'6".

I'd treat this very much like a desire for a pony. Yep, ponies are nice. In a perfect world, we'd all have ponies. Nope, not going to feel sorry for you because you don't have one.

[Anonymous]

wrestling, tennis, gymnastics .... actually most sports, not basketball. You probably don't want him doing football but even Freshmen Football takes everyone, as does cross country.

Shorter men try harder. Don't tell him that but if he turns out to be short it isn' all bad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 13-year old (turns 14 in mid-Sept) is around 5’2” and has not hit growth spurt yet. If you see him with a group of classmates and peers, he does not appear short, just average. We all grew later in my family. He also had an X-ray of ankle from an injury and we were told the growth plates are wide open.

Growing up, I remember all the girls at 13 being taller than the boys. I think with hormones/chemicals kids are just hitting their spurts earlier nowadays. It’s perfectly normal for a boy not to ha e sprouted. My brothers “tall” MS friend was 5’8” and stayed there. My brother ended up 6’3” by Fresmen year in college.

They are. My dr said it used to happen around 15 for majority of boys.

What used to happen? The growth spurt?

[Anonymous]

Prioritize sleep!!

[Anonymous]

Thank you for all your comments. My son sleeps normally 9-10 hours a night.

[Anonymous]

Sorry...meant to also say he drinks whole milk everyday

[Anonymous]

OP - as a PP has mentioned, off your son is only a Tanner 1 (which is that he hasn’t started puberty at all) or a 2 (just starting), he has not hit his growth spurt yet and certainly not his peak height velocity.

Of course final adult height is really hard to estimate, and a pediatrician just going by growth curves and percentiles don’t have the full picture. My DS’s pediatrician, going by where he was on the growth chart at his last check up (15 years) predicted 5’8”. But this was a different ped from the one who actually recommended we see a pediatric endocrinologist for lack of growth when DS was 12. That specialist, after following DS thru the start of puberty, the benefit of hand-wrist bone xrays, family heights, etc predicted 5’10”. DS is now on path to exceed that (and is already taller than the 5’8” predicted by the pediatrician 10 months ago.

Our parental heights are similar to yours, I’m 5’3” and DH is 6’2”. So where my kids ended up is a crap shoot!

[Anonymous]

*if* your son is only a Tanner 1. Fat thumbs on cell phone!

[Anonymous]

My son's pediatrician predicted his adult height to be 5'9" when he was 8 or 9. He is now 17, about to graduate high school, and he's 5'9" and hasn't grown for a while. He had his main growth spurt between 13.5 and 14 and was probably 5'4 when he started high school (right before turning 14). For most of 8th grade, he looked and sounded like he was 10 or 11.

Just because everyone has a husband, son, nephew, uncle, etc. who is over 6 feet doesn't mean that every male child will eventually get there if they just sleep a lot and drink milk. Being 5'7 is just as "normal" as being 6'2.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My 14 yr old is 5’3 and desperately wants to be taller and is concerned he won’t get to at least 5’9. His dad is 6’1 but I am 5’0. The doctor predicts based on his growth chart 5’6 to 5’7. How rough is it for teens/men on the shorter side? He is not only concerned with sports but dating (e.g. girls like taller boys). I so far have told him that he can’t control how tall he will be and that he isn’t done growing and that when he achieves his full height (whatever it is) that his character, personality and efforts in life are more important in life than height.

My stepsons were short when they were young, and with a 5' mom and a 6' dad, who knew where they'd end up. But my DH's friends (all tall) had some weird affinity for reminding these boys that (a) they were short, and (b) they probably wouldn't be tall because of their mom.

So I would remind them that they couldn't do anything about their height, but they did have control over their education, career, and future earnings. And the goal was to OUT EARN these tall a-holes. I told them about my short doctor who drove a Lexus and spent a month every year in France, I told them about my short dentist who drove a Mercedes and had a beach house. These tall college-drop out friends of Dads had nothing on these educated men, except height.

It is hard, OP, for short boys whose friends are all a head taller. But I think it's a more even playing field when they're adults. FWIW, my brother is only 5'8"...and never lacked for attractive women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Boys can grow until about age 18 to 20. If he does end up 5 ft 6 or 7, it’s a little short but not bad because many women are 5 ft 6 or shorter. I wouldn’t worry about it! Tell him not to worry.

Not all of these women will want to marry a 5’6” man —especially because they might want to avoid having shorter than average sons. Many men like petite women, so there’s a lot of competition for a 5’0”-5’6” woman.

So all the short men in the world are single? I had no idea.

[Anonymous]

My husband is 5'8" and has never lacked for female attention. The biggest (male) "player" I know is about 5'5" and the women he has dated have all been very attractive. Of course height helps, but a lot of sex appeal is charm and personality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My husband is 5'8" and has never lacked for female attention. The biggest (male) "player" I know is about 5'5" and the women he has dated have all been very attractive. Of course height helps, but a lot of sex appeal is charm and personality.

+1 be physically fit, funny, kind, and definitely helps to make good money.

Remember Tom Cruise is only 5'7 if that. Robert Downy Jr is like 5'9 or something.

[Anonymous]

As a 5'6" woman married to a 5'7" man, it's annoying to see all these posters on how to "fix" your son. Sure, he should eat and sleep well but focusing on being comfortable in his own skin is way more important imo. One of my sons will likely be close to my DH's height. It is what it is. I admire how comfortable my husband is with this height and am hoping to see that in my son too.