Bragging about tall kids

[Anonymous]

OP here. I’m 5’11” (female) so I’ve seen this from both sides. But it wasn’t until I had a short teen boy and saw how he’s treated by the tall, dominant (and often younger) kids in sports that I realized how cruel they are and how much status height brings to young teens. At the same time the parents of those kids, some of whom likely will stop growing at 5’ 8” after reaching close to that height at 12 seem obsessed with how amazing their kid is because of their early puberty and oblivious to how unpleasant they are. Like someone else said, focusing on height as superior is misguided but particularly so when it’s still a waiting game to see where they end up. (And my kid, who is actually 5’ 5” not 4 - that was a typo - is beginning of Tanner stage 2 and has significant bone age delay so yeah, while I don’t know where he’ll end up, I do know he has about four or more years to grow and also has two very tall parents).

On the other hand, as a tall teen girl my height was uncomfortable. I hated the constant comments and slouched to seem shorter. So I get that too. I just didn’t realize when I was a teen how overlooked the shorter boys were.

[Anonymous]

OP. I’m the poster above. My guess is that you carry a chip on your shoulder and look to blame other tall kids and their parents for your insecurity. My tall 13 year old has never once bullied shorter kids on his team or opposing teams nor have I seen that from other tall kids. And his is in a very competitive contact sport. Get over yourself and stop imagining things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP. I’m the poster above. My guess is that you carry a chip on your shoulder and look to blame other tall kids and their parents for your insecurity. My tall 13 year old has never once bullied shorter kids on his team or opposing teams nor have I seen that from other tall kids. And his is in a very competitive contact sport. Get over yourself and stop imagining things.

Spoken like an oblivious parent

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Insecure parents with short kids are annoying. Especially sports parents with anxiety. I have a 13 year old who is 5’11. I’ve never bragged about him being tall. Why? Because it is basically irrelevant to me. In fact, he did hit puberty early and I don’t expect him to get much taller. I’m so sick of these parents suggesting that my kid excels in his sport because he is tall. Um. Wrong. My kid has always excelled in his sport - even prior to his growth spurt. If anything, growing so tall so fast made it harder for his body to adjust. I can’t tell you how many parents on his team push their anxiety onto me with their suggestions that my kid somehow has an unfair advantage. I then have to comfort them about my kids early growth spurt, etc. It’s exhausting. Just chill the f out about your kids height. It will be what it will be.

It’s irrelevant because you have zero experience with a late blooming boy. You have no idea what you’re talking about or what other people’s experiences are. An early blooming 13 yr old boy has everything sports related handed to him on a platter. The other kids have to work 2x as hard to get in the game and have the coach notice him. The coaches seem to only see the buoys.

[Anonymous]

OP, social media is not for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not bragging about his feet so much as looking for sympathy. Size 14 shoes are hard to find in stores and expensive AF.

And as a PP said, he’s just really freaking tall. It’s an objective fact. And your son may be kinder or smarter than him, but he’s definitely not going to be taller than him.

You’re the one making a big deal out of it.

Truth. Thankfully we have the internet. My son also wears size 14 shoes and they are especially hard to find when they want a certain brand. I just ordered a specific pair of slides that ran small in 15s.

I’m not bragging but happy if I talk about it. He was 5’2 for most of middle school and self conscious.

If he was 5’2” in middle school he was right in the middle of the pack and had nothing to be self conscious about.

My son was 5’3” at 13 and Tanner 2 for puberty. He ended up being 6’. He was always in the 50 - 75%tile. Always rolling along in the middle. Perfect place to be in my opinion.

Come on, you say that as a rational adult. As a parent you understand kids are always self conscious. When he was the average middle school kid he only saw the tall kids. Now that he’s the tall kid, he isn’t noticing that, but only hearing about the ones bragging about having 4.5 and 1600 SAT scores and D1 recruits as college applications approach. He doesn’t have anything like that academically or athletically. Kids will always be self conscious about something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP. I’m the poster above. My guess is that you carry a chip on your shoulder and look to blame other tall kids and their parents for your insecurity. My tall 13 year old has never once bullied shorter kids on his team or opposing teams nor have I seen that from other tall kids. And his is in a very competitive contact sport. Get over yourself and stop imagining things.

OP here, do you deny that height gives young teens status?

Btw, I’m not imagining things, as confirmed by many other posters here.

[Anonymous]

OP, I get where you are coming from. I posted a hand wringing thread about my tiny late blooming son and sports at some point, though he was younger than yours. There have been other threads about this too.

Because that is what you are really getting at, right? Sports? Most sports will not be possible to play at the high school level for very late blooming boys. It isn’t even about height, but about physical maturity. I’m sorry, but it is true. And your DS is even later blooming than mine was. I will tell you from experience that you just need to accept this in your mind and move on. Your DS will figure things out on his own- just be encouraging of him in whatever he wants to do.

My DS (now a senior and 6’1”) dropped team sports freshman year and found other things to do. At that time he was 5’5” maybe 110lbs? and it was clearly going to be quite awhile before he “caught up” physically. He decided to move on and focus on other interests. Anyway- as a Senior, he is a great student, plays golf and tennis recreationally, goes to the gym three times/wk, has a part time job, does volunteer work, had friends and is happy. Sports are not everything. And it isn’t other people’s fault that your kid, and mine, got a bum deal in the puberty lottery. It is just life, and it really does not matter in the long run.

[Anonymous]

Well, my husband and my daughters are short, but I think they’re just right. Try to stop comparing. And let others be proud of their kids!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I get where you are coming from. I posted a hand wringing thread about my tiny late blooming son and sports at some point, though he was younger than yours. There have been other threads about this too.

Because that is what you are really getting at, right? Sports? Most sports will not be possible to play at the high school level for very late blooming boys. It isn’t even about height, but about physical maturity. I’m sorry, but it is true. And your DS is even later blooming than mine was. I will tell you from experience that you just need to accept this in your mind and move on. Your DS will figure things out on his own- just be encouraging of him in whatever he wants to do.

My DS (now a senior and 6’1”) dropped team sports freshman year and found other things to do. At that time he was 5’5” maybe 110lbs? and it was clearly going to be quite awhile before he “caught up” physically. He decided to move on and focus on other interests. Anyway- as a Senior, he is a great student, plays golf and tennis recreationally, goes to the gym three times/wk, has a part time job, does volunteer work, had friends and is happy. Sports are not everything. And it isn’t other people’s fault that your kid, and mine, got a bum deal in the puberty lottery. It is just life, and it really does not matter in the long run.

OP again, actually no, he’s not particularly into sports (never has been) so that’s not the issue. It’s just me with a rant about the weird bragging and a comment on the meanness that seems to sometimes accompany the dominant tall kids which the parents are seemingly unaware of.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most of us brag occasionally and get humbled just as much. It's the human condition. I don't mind hearing it and while I have a just below avg. height middle schooler, I do marvel at and remark on the growth of other kids because it never ceases to amaze me how kids grow so quickly.

It used to make my eyes roll back to hear "dd/ds is just so blonde and has beautiful blue eyes blah blah blah everyone one in *insert foreign country* wants to touch them..." But once I had kids of my own, I get being in awe of your own precious child's attributes. It's good to take note of these reminders not to brag but I think it's OK to let people toot their horn occasionally when we have plenty of other obstacles to face.

Ha! I had that blond kid, actually two of them, close in age. The amount of attention they got was astounding! It was actually pretty annoying, and sometimes intrusive too (like when people ran after us or grabbed our babies). I didn’t get it at the time, and found answering the same questions again and again mostly from strangers pretty tiresome (but you always have to be polite) but now they are older looking back at photos I get that they did look more dramatic? Noticeable?

You make good points though, but I wonder how much of this is driven by comments from strangers anyway. People comment on remarkable height like they do on remarkable features.

Blonde hair as a child is not remarkable in America. I understand if you’re in another country, maybe, but not here. My son had beautiful white blonde hair and the only unusual thing was people assumed he was a girl, even at five years old. Hair wasted on a boy. No one wanted to touch his hair.

[Anonymous]

I should say, it’s not the crux of the issue. It’s not irrelevant as it’s where my observations have come from.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In support of OP, there is a hierarchy among teen boys based on height and size — particularly if they play sports.

My DS is 14 and 5’10 1/2. He will be 6’3 to 6’5 by the time he’s done growing, based on father and grandfather’s heights and growth patterns.

He has same-aged friends who are 5’2” and 5’4” and they are hazed and bullied by the bigger, taller kids. Coaches rule them out, especially in basketball and football.

I also do see dad in particular (I’m a mom) bragging on how big their kid is. It’s a tough time for a 5’4” 15 yr old.

Encourage your boys to be kind.

What Tanner stage is he at 14 years old? And you can’t predict height based in two males in his family. Your height matters more than grandfathers. What is your height?

And that’s just a rough estimate. Siblings would all be the same height if that formula was 100% accurate.

Shut up

As soon as pp stops writing inaccurate information. Height isn’t determined by father and grandfather alone. Everyone knows that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I get where you are coming from. I posted a hand wringing thread about my tiny late blooming son and sports at some point, though he was younger than yours. There have been other threads about this too.

Because that is what you are really getting at, right? Sports? Most sports will not be possible to play at the high school level for very late blooming boys. It isn’t even about height, but about physical maturity. I’m sorry, but it is true. And your DS is even later blooming than mine was. I will tell you from experience that you just need to accept this in your mind and move on. Your DS will figure things out on his own- just be encouraging of him in whatever he wants to do.

My DS (now a senior and 6’1”) dropped team sports freshman year and found other things to do. At that time he was 5’5” maybe 110lbs? and it was clearly going to be quite awhile before he “caught up” physically. He decided to move on and focus on other interests. Anyway- as a Senior, he is a great student, plays golf and tennis recreationally, goes to the gym three times/wk, has a part time job, does volunteer work, had friends and is happy. Sports are not everything. And it isn’t other people’s fault that your kid, and mine, got a bum deal in the puberty lottery. It is just life, and it really does not matter in the long run.

Maybe team sports are tough for late bloomers but some individual sports are fine. One of my kids switched to fencing and really likes it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In support of OP, there is a hierarchy among teen boys based on height and size — particularly if they play sports.

My DS is 14 and 5’10 1/2. He will be 6’3 to 6’5 by the time he’s done growing, based on father and grandfather’s heights and growth patterns.

He has same-aged friends who are 5’2” and 5’4” and they are hazed and bullied by the bigger, taller kids. Coaches rule them out, especially in basketball and football.

I also do see dad in particular (I’m a mom) bragging on how big their kid is. It’s a tough time for a 5’4” 15 yr old.

Encourage your boys to be kind.

What Tanner stage is he at 14 years old? And you can’t predict height based in two males in his family. Your height matters more than grandfathers. What is your height?

And that’s just a rough estimate. Siblings would all be the same height if that formula was 100% accurate.

Shut up

As soon as pp stops writing inaccurate information. Height isn’t determined by father and grandfather alone. Everyone knows that.

No it’s determined by you