Comparing heights of children

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I have a mum friend who often mentions her kids’ heights when they happen to be taller than mine at the time. Like oh is James taller than Ben now? Oh yes look he is. And with our girls as well. I don’t get it. My DD is taller than hers now I think and suddenly it’s not mentioned.

She herself is quite tall but within normal range.
My sister is 5ft10 and often mentions her height. I’m not that much smaller than her.

aibu it really doesn’t matter if kids are taller or shorter unless you think there’s an actual medical problem?!!! Not sure why she keeps mentioning it.

@WineCap we obviously need to stop reinforcing a false narrative about height and discrimination against shorter people then, don’t we? That’s a bit like saying it’s unfortunate that there is racial
bias.

She herself is quite tall but within normal range.
My sister is 5ft10 and often mentions her height. I’m not that much smaller than her.

Am I reading this right - that you are taller than your height-obsessive acquaintance?

As you've just described her as a frenemy, why not fight fire with fire?
Next time she bangs on, tell her "I know! But I'm still taller than you, isn't that funny?"

Sigh. Of course a nutritious balanced diet in childhood (which happens to include plenty of vegetables) helps us to develop and grow into the tallest healthiest version of ourselves that our 'instructions' allow. We are built of what we eat. But you are looking at it in the wrong direction and are missing that it allows us to reach our own personal genetically set optimum self. A good diet isn't going to make someone who was always going to be shorter tall, but a poor diet can cause someone to be shorter than they may otherwise have been eg your genes may be such that the maximum height you could grow to if all the stars aligned might be 5'6'', but due to diet or environmental factors during your childhood, you may only reach 5'5" or 5'5.5" etc. It is the reason identical twins can grow to be different heights.

I highly recommend the programme - the whole series is really interesting and it explains this topic much better than I am here! It's called 'A thorough examination with Drs Chris and Xand' and is available on BBC Sounds.

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Even benign comments comparing kids heights can be pai

Nful for some... you don't know why they might be more petite or indeed taller than other children. It's not always a blessing to have tall child if they're suffering from marfan syndrome. It doesn't feel great when people comment on how tiny my daughter is given that she has some genetic stuff going on.

My 16 year old has always been a fussy/faddy eater and is petite (she's 5'1 ) her cousin was also very fussy eater when she was young and she's now 5'11! I'm pretty sure genetics played a bigger part than fussy eating!

Completely my experience too that children and their behaviours are judged on height instead of age. There was a point where I felt like attaching age badges to them saying "I'm only N you prat". Parents would actually make comments like "but s/he looks four" when I pointed out the child they were expecting to respond to complex instructions was in fact less than two years old. Its almost is if their initial perception prevents them taking in factual information.

Then the joy that isn't taking out a second mortgage every time you need new school shoes, VAT on their shoes years before they even get near secondary school, school uniforms which look like sacks because children''s uniforms don't come in width fittings and to get uniform long enough its three times too wide.

Then best of all, especially when they are pre teen/early teenage is those helpful parents who comment on their height saying it must be impossible to get decent/fashionable clothes or constantly commenting on height. Really would you stand there loudly making rude or undermining comments to a fat child? If not why undermine the body confidence of a tall child?

Are you genuinely ignorant enough to think tall people are better than short people?! Seriously?! Wow. Ok.

And also. @SkankingWombat didn’t say that. She pointed out that there are environmental factors that can, very marginally, impact your height. She never said being tall meant you were better or that having short children meant you were a bad parent! Growing up in a cold country is a factor that makes people taller - are you honestly suggesting people from warm countries have bad parents?

If the children actually are unusually tall they will get comments about it for the rest of their life. It’s really annoying. So nice they are being given the message it’s a positive as children.

So much bile directed towards tall people who incidentally can’t help their height, just like shorter people. “Praying mantis“ good grief there would be outrage if I came on with stereotypes about shorter people (short-arse angry little man with a chip on his shoulder sort of thing - not my opinion btw, just an example). I would never comment that a smaller child was “sooooo short” but plenty feel it’s fine to comment my child was “sooooooo TALL”. Well, tall if you want to compare to your child, yes, but actually has never been out of his age for clothes and doesn’t tower over his peers. I’ve never come across a tall person that thought their height made them better than anyone else but have come across plenty who are incredibly self conscious because of it. Good on those who carry their height with confidence tall or short.

If you are unusually anything you'll get comments about it the rest of your life though. (Short/tall/hair colour/freckly etc) I'm very short and I get lots of comments about it.

I often make a joke about my height almost as a self defence mechanism so that other people don't get to make one at my expense.

I can also add at 5'10 a lot of men have told me I'm too tall. I hate being this tall even though it's a normal height, it's been annoying for so many reasons.

Yup it’s not something I bring up but people have always mentioned my ds’s height which doesn’t particularly bother me but I’m tall his dads tall and various family members are also tall so it’s just genetics I’m not feeding him some magic growth powder so never really knew what to say

what did bother me a bit was comments when he was younger ie still in a pushchair age two and people thinking he was older and why wasn’t he walking / what aren’t you at school today, normally said by I’m sure well meaning older people just trying to make conversation out at the shops etc so then I’d say oh he just tall for his age he’s only 2/3 etc

now he’s at senior school it’s less noticeable and he blends in with the older kids who are his height and also been at a bigger school means there’s more kids in his year that are also tall

My DS is the tallest in his class. People often mention how tall he is in comparison to others. To date aside from his reach it has not benefited him. It completely worked against him. He's never been treated as 'little' even when very young and with his peers and they were.

Ignorant people look at him and think he's tall and therefore assume he is older and will be able to do and understand things his peers don't (even when he was a toddler). They will also for some reason assume confidence comes with size. He's actually super shy, anxious and scared of everything and everyone.

During covid when school were letting the kids come into school in time slots by year groups he got told off by the head for coming in before his slot. She assumed by his height he was a couple of years ahead of where he was didn't even ask him what year he was before telling him off in front of other kids and parents. He's too shy to correct a grown up. That's just one small example.

Stark difference to elder DC who was always little compared to classmates and treated much nicer.

Sometimes I talk about his height but probably along the lines of 'it seemed like last week I was rolling his trousers up and this week they are flapping around his ankles!'

My eldest DS is 11 and has always been tall. But people expect more of him because of it as they assume he’s older.
Being taller also makes him an easy target for bullies. He’s a sensitive, gentle soul and has always struggled making friends. The boys who are much shorter than him get a real joy out of being able to bully someone bigger than them. “Huh Huh, look how hard I am punching someone taller than me.” basically.
And yet if my DS ever punches them back one day he’ll be the one who gets most of the aggro from teachers/pupils/bully’s parents etc… because he’s tall!

All that being said, he suits being tall. I like him being tall because that’s one of the things that makes him him and I don’t see why I shouldn’t admire my son. I never go bragging about it as though he’s superior to anyone else, but I don’t see why I should never mention what I like about him. He has lovely blonde hair too, and gorgeous hazel eyes… if I mention that, does that mean I’m pulling down people with brunette hair and brown eyes? Not at all.

I used to go out with someone who was tall (6 ft 4). The thing is, he mentioned it far too often - would shoehorn it into conversations where it didn’t belong. He had relatives who mentioned it a lot. The best way to annoy him would be not to react to any mention of the tallness.

All those bemoaning their tall DC's, they will never be made to feel inferior for being smaller. Tall is seen as better no matter how you spin it.

Pinkflop, I think there can be a lot of disadvantages being tall despite it being seen as a good thing by society. As for being small, yes it’s seen as a negative by society in general, but there are some advantages like longevity. If I could choose I’d be average height. People need to be kinder and not judge or make comments about other peoples’ physical attributes. If you want to internally boast about your own child fine but there is no need to do it in front of other parents surely.

Really? Not for women.

People use phrases like ‘towering’ and ‘thundering’ along to describe tall women who are bigger than a size 10.

I worked with a tall woman who was very slim who told me she found it so hard to find a partner who was tall enough to make her feel feminine. In the end she married someone who was 6ft 5 and she said she loved feeling short beside him. She also was really annoyed when she saw small women with tall men as she felt they could at least leave the taller men for the taller women.

But I agree it must be very hard to be a short man. I am short myself and only dated one short man who was probably 5ft 4 in height. I felt we looked like two children walking together and it made me feel very uncomfortable at the time.

I'm 5 foot 3 and I had a friend who was about 5 foot 6. She went on and on about how small I am which I thought was odd. She used to say oh I can barely see you in a crowd you're tiny etc. Odd behaviour lol. My son is going to be a small man and I'd be a liar if I said it didn't worry me.

I'm 4ft 11 and have so far a very credible highly paid job. And no shortage of suitors in my younger days. Makes not a jot of difference. I also know short men going out with taller women. So what. People that see height as a discussion point have nothing much to contribute to an interesting conversation!!

She also was really annoyed when she saw small women with tall men as she felt they could at least leave the taller men for the taller women.

What a daft idea.

It matters to the dcs. My ds was the shortest in his year for ages and was teased by the others. Now he's overtaking them all and is much happier.

I actually don’t know who’s taller, we’re very similar heights!