My son is short - help me get over it please

[Anonymous]

DH is 5'6 had a PHd and is married to ME! I am 5'2 and our son is over 6ft!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH is 5'6 had a PHd and is married to ME! I am 5'2 and our son is over 6ft!

wow.. what happened there? There must be tall people on someone's side of the family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My brother is 5'6". He's super smart and professionally successful, very good looking, and has an equally (if not more) attractive and successful wife. Height doesn't have as much to do with it as you think.

My DH is also relatively short 5'8". And I could say all of the same things about him

Smart and professionally successful. That is key to a good life for him. Being handsome, kind, and charming helps too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One of my kids is really short. 7th percentile for height. I’ve taken him for medical testing and there’s no hormonal problem, so he doesn’t qualify for growth hormone. I’ve focused on dietary supplements, but he’s a terrible eater. My other three kids are average height with one being very tall. I am short myself, but I always thought the “short genes” only ran with the women in our family since the men are all over 5’9” and my dad is 6’2”. My husband is 6’0”.

My son who is short is only 7 years old. But, at this point, with no medical problem and with his growth remaining around the 10th percentile for four years, I’m coming to realize I need to accept the fact that he’s just really small. If he stays at this percentile, the doctor predicts he will be 5’6”. It makes me feel really sad and anxious when I see him with the other boys his age and he’s a lot smaller than them. He’s also not really athletic.

He’s very smart, adorable, funny, kind. He’s an incredible kid and I feel like a total jerk for not being able to accept the blessing of a healthy child and instead feeling so upset inside about his height. There are a lot of societal stereotypes about short people and dating is hard for short men. I’m worried about teasing and him being made fun of, even as an older man.

Can someone please provide me with any helpful thoughts or wisdom to work my way through this? I hate feeling this way and just want to give him the love he deserves.

It really is a drawback, but smart/adorable/funny/kind help ameliorate it, and have a great deal of long term value. Better short with those good qualities, than tall, but dumb/hateful/boring/mean. My one suggestion is that you continue to push the athletic side - he might not be great at baseball/basketball/etc, but being at least marginally competent will improve his social life markedly, at least through high school.

[Anonymous]

In order to help your son deal with any potential bullying, you should focus on making sure he knows all the things about himself that are wonderful, especially the things that he can control (i.e. NOT his physical appearance). In doing so hopefully you will be able to appreciate those things about him as well and his height will cease to matter to you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of my kids is really short. 7th percentile for height. I’ve taken him for medical testing and there’s no hormonal problem, so he doesn’t qualify for growth hormone. I’ve focused on dietary supplements, but he’s a terrible eater. My other three kids are average height with one being very tall. I am short myself, but I always thought the “short genes” only ran with the women in our family since the men are all over 5’9” and my dad is 6’2”. My husband is 6’0”.

My son who is short is only 7 years old. But, at this point, with no medical problem and with his growth remaining around the 10th percentile for four years, I’m coming to realize I need to accept the fact that he’s just really small. If he stays at this percentile, the doctor predicts he will be 5’6”. It makes me feel really sad and anxious when I see him with the other boys his age and he’s a lot smaller than them. He’s also not really athletic.

He’s very smart, adorable, funny, kind. He’s an incredible kid and I feel like a total jerk for not being able to accept the blessing of a healthy child and instead feeling so upset inside about his height. There are a lot of societal stereotypes about short people and dating is hard for short men. I’m worried about teasing and him being made fun of, even as an older man.

Can someone please provide me with any helpful thoughts or wisdom to work my way through this? I hate feeling this way and just want to give him the love he deserves.

It really is a drawback, but smart/adorable/funny/kind help ameliorate it, and have a great deal of long term value. Better short with those good qualities, than tall, but dumb/hateful/boring/mean. My one suggestion is that you continue to push the athletic side - he might not be great at baseball/basketball/etc, but being at least marginally competent will improve his social life markedly, at least through high school.

The short kid who grows up to make a seven figure salary will fare better than the short kid who was the high school varsity baseball star. Push academics, not athletics (to the extreme)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Thank you everyone for the comments, encouragement, and examples. of short stature not being an impediment. I’m going to work hard to make sure my anxieties don’t turn into a negative influence on him. I really appreciate everyone’s support.

You should be ashamed of yourself. You are a terrible person and mother.

[Anonymous]

My cousin was super short growing up. His parents took him to mutiple speciaists and nothing was wrong with him. He's now a respectable 5"10.

[Anonymous]

My son is in the 1.7th percentile for height.
Not 17th.
1 . 7

It sucks completely.

[Anonymous]

Pretty much every male actor is 5-7 or below

Dinero
Hoffman
Cruze
Stallone
Pacino
Fox
Black
Franco
Wahlberg
Stiller
Hart
Sheen
Crystal

.... the list goes on and on

[Anonymous]

Diet does not impact height, except in cases of extreme malnourishment, so stop worrying about that.

[Anonymous]

And most men are NOT more than 6 feet tall. I see more short-to-average men than tall men.

[Anonymous]

You are not a terrible person for feeling this way, OP. I struggled with the same thing with my oldest. I had IUGR and delivered at 34 weeks. He only weighed 4 pounds. But, he was completely healthy in every way. My pediatrician tracked his growth and told me he would never fully catch up and that he would likely be very short. I couldn't help but feel sad. It's normal. Now that my kids are grown, I can see how insignificant height is. It really wouldn't have mattered if he had been 5'5. He would still have been a happy, healthy, athletic, successful kid.

He completely defied everything we were told. He was short until middle school. He is 31 now. And 6'3.

[Anonymous]

Op, did anyone in your family have a constitutional growth delay? Your son might sprout in high school and end up much taller than you think. Kids grow differently. The growth chart is not an accurate prediction of an adult height. Especially once children hit puberty

[Anonymous]

Deal with it. Imagine the opposite. DS is big. Full size adult. He attended a halloween party where he was giant among kids where he was only a year or two older than. The first question out of most parents' mouths is usually about his age. Nothing I can do about it. I laugh it off. Can't change genetics.