"He's always been on the 99th centile"

[StickerPlace]

I'm in a bad mood this morning. So I may we'll BU.

But I've seen this twice today. (Granted was on the same thread about child size)

But I feel like I've read/heard that comment so many times. But it can't be true?

Or are the 1% of parents with 99% children very keen to talk about that?

(FWIW just weighed/measured mine for new dance uniform as had a growth spurt and nothing fits and 11th centile.)

My first was 11lbs when born and on the 99th centile till a teenager.

People constantly remarked to me about his size as a baby he looked months older than he was and until teenage years he looked a couple of years old.

So in response I always had to explain. If people kept their remarks to themselves I wouldn't have had to respond.

DD was on born on the 98th percentile for weight and length and stayed on it pretty consistently till she past toddlerhood, at which point she sort of...stretched. She's ten now and on 75th percentile for height and 16th for weight.

Her younger brother was born on the 75th percentile for length and 25th for weight. He's 7 now and on the 98th for length but only the 3rd for weight, which worries me somewhat, although he seems otherwise perfectly healthy and full of energy.

As someone whose child was at the other end of the chart, I was constantly nagged about his weight. It was awful. The HV bullied me into taking him every week to be weighed. She made me feel terrible, that I was doing something wrong. She threatened me with sending him to hospital.
At this point my friend rang the local children's hospital and we got to speak to a doctor who was happy with the weight gains he was making. He said being at the bottom end of the scale didn't matter as long as there was increase. He was not impressed with the health visitor's behaviour and she stopped bothering me after he contacted her.

My son is a normal height and weight as an adult.

I've not read the whole thread but my 11 year old is 5ft 2/5ft 3, has an adult size 6/almost 7 feet and needs to wear mens sized clothing.

He hasn't started puberty yet and last year he had a size 5 feet and was a good 3-4inches smaller but still very tall.

I remark on him being on the 99th centile for height and weight when people comment on his size. He has always been tall and that makes that clear, for him this is nothing out of the ordinary.

NC4post99 "It’s 99.6 actually"

Why are all the actual centile height/weight charts state "95th" as the top line? Where have I missed the 99.6 line? Can't see where it is on the chart.

I’m a hcp working in child health and I wrote an assignment on the introduction of the WHO growth charts at the time, they came out in UK in 2008/2009 and are based on optimal growth of children in 6 areas (USA, Brazil, India, Norway, an African country and somewhere else, can’t remember). It’s optimal growth of how children should be growing not actual average and nowhere in the UK was used. This is for the 0-4 year charts, the 4+ charts are based on UK 1990 data. So there are more than 1% of UK children on the 99th centile.
I’m also a parent of teenagers, they’re both 5ft 8 but this means dd is 91st centile and ds is 25th. They both look fairly slim and people might comment that they’re skinny or slim, in reality they’re probably equal height and weight centiles. It’s ok though, they’ve got a short fat mum.

@mumda

As someone whose child was at the other end of the chart, I was constantly nagged about his weight. It was awful. The HV bullied me into taking him every week to be weighed. She made me feel terrible, that I was doing something wrong. She threatened me with sending him to hospital. At this point my friend rang the local children's hospital and we got to speak to a doctor who was happy with the weight gains he was making. He said being at the bottom end of the scale didn't matter as long as there was increase. He was not impressed with the health visitor's behaviour and she stopped bothering me after he contacted her.

My son is a normal height and weight as an adult.

One of my friends also felt nagged about her firstborns low weight. They kept food diaries and everything. They were referred to a pediatrician. He took one look at my friend, who is very skinny, and her husband, who is also very skinny, and concluded that the kid looks like his parents.

My friend and her husband just happen to be one of those people that eats cheese and chocolate cake and doesn't gain weight. I've seen them eat, they're just naturally skinny.

Nex18 As a HCP, could you clarify whether the top line on the charts is the 95th or 99th centile? I'm puzzled as the OP talks about 99th centile and when I said it was 95th (as per the charts) someone corrected me that it was in fact "99.6 actually" (let alone 99 or 95).

Have I missed something? Where is the 99th (or 99.6th!) centile on the height and weight charts? Hoping you can clear it up. I really can't see where it says 99th!

The centiles are out of date, they were done years ago and people are taller now.

@underneaththeash

The centiles are out of date, they were done years ago and people are taller now.

Apparently only 32 years. Not sure how much its changed in that time

Mines on the 99th and I probably speak about it too much 😂

@Hellosunshiner 99.6th, then 98th, 91st. Even in dd’s 2002 edition red book, I just checked. Are you looking at non UK charts maybe. www.rcpch.ac.uk/resources/uk-who-growth-charts-0-4-years

Thanks for that nex18!

More a wonder if how only 1/100 people can be on 99th that it's so frequent to see people say their child is 99th

I think what this thread proves is that you are interpreting the data wrong. It's not that everyone has a kid on the 99th percentile, it's that those who do are more likely to need to mention it than those whose children hang around the median.

Why would anyone ever need to tell you their child tracks on the 60th percentile? It is unremarkable. People with kids on the 99th probably have been made to feel defensive about the size/weight of their child and are pre-empting. My child was around the tenth percentile for her first year or so and I also found myself saying it a lot, because everybody commented how tiny she was.

I don't hear it much but then I don't talk about it much. I don't know what ds is but I can tell you when he was born he was in 99th percentile. He was so tall that my short ass body couldn't give him enough room so he needed physio when he was born as his feet had stuck at a funny angle.

He is tall but I wouldn't say he is any taller than my friends children born around the same time.

@Hellosunshiner

www.rcpch.ac.uk/sites/default/files/Boys_0-4_years_growth_chart.pdf

For instance, they go from 0.4 - 99.6. Are you outside of the UK, I’ve seen some charts do 3rd-97th

I remember talking about this a lot when mine was a few weeks old as I had been told it needed monitoring and was worried. Haven't mentioned it since I stopped getting comments from other people though...

@Fizbosshoes

I thought it was a MN trope that everyone's DS is 6 foot tall at 12yo and eats 7 dinners a day?

Yes I've noticed this. (All sustained by the MN chicken)

As well as everyone (or their 6'2" DH....or both) earning 100k but only buying 1 chicken with their earnings

You mean the 6ft 2 rugby player husband.

@FailureToLurk

I think I'd rather a 99 centile child than a 25 centil child which I have.

I'm fed up of people pointing out how small he is, that he is younger than he is, am I not feeding him enough, surely at 7 he should be bigger 🤦🏻‍♀️

His father is 6ft4 I'm 5ft3 he's probably going to end up somewhere in the middle.

I think that's part of what irked me a little this morning (hence the thread)

DD has had a growth spurt. So I measured her and just double checked uniform size with dance mums on the WhatsApp before finalising order.

Someone chipped in with "omg my DD same age outgrew that size ageeeees ago" as if she hasn't noticed my child is small. It's the mock surprise that my child the woman sees often is small. Her DD is the same school year but a lot taller (99%)

I measured my DD - she's 11% - She's 9 and herself now sometimes says she's small/skinny etc. And it makes me worry for her.

I'm short. It's no surprise. But I don't like her feeling sad about being little.

@SleepingStandingUp anecdotally I think it's changed a lot in that time. I'm 34 and when I was a child it was really rare to see overweight children. There would maybe be one in a class. Now apparently 20% of children are overweight, maybe more since the pandemic

@MaggieMooh

Our society values tall people. Tall women become models. Tall men are desirable, women often don’t want to date men who are less than 6ft. So a tall child is seen as something to be proud of, the same as having a child that’s very clever or talented.

I was certainly feeling that today. Lovely long legs comments etc.

Luckily for my Janet Manrara is a very popular role model so her being so small helps my DD feel better.

I don’t think you have a sound grasp of statistics here - if a child is above the 99th centile that’s 1 in 100. Over the 90th centile is 1 in 10 - that’s fairly common odds.

The thing is, as well, is that the grass is always greener - you feel bad your DD is short. People with tall young children feel bad too as the societal expectation is that they must be older and should behave better. DS at 5 is the height of a 7 year old. Developmentally, he’s about 18 months to 2 years. Believe me, it would be easier if he was smaller!!

[quote shouldistop]@SleepingStandingUp anecdotally I think it's changed a lot in that time. I'm 34 and when I was a child it was really rare to see overweight children. There would maybe be one in a class. Now apparently 20% of children are overweight, maybe more since the pandemic [/quote]
It isn't just about fat kids tho, percentiles also cover height. Both my twins came out tall as well as squishy 😂

@SleepingStandingUp I know, every generation seems to get taller so I'd imagine that's changed in 32 years too.