Does the height and weight of a 2 year old correlate to what it will be as an adult?

[Gangle]

DS1 is 2.6, 89 cm tall and 14.1 kilos. making him 25th centile for height and 75th for weight. He has pretty much always been 75/25 for height and weight. Just wondered, does what they measure and weigh at this age bear any relation to what they will be as adults? I am 5ft 6 and DH 5.9, neither of which are short, in the UK anyway, so I would be surprised if DS ended in in the 25th centile for height. In addition, DH is very very skinny, I'm slim with a low BMI so I would again be surprised if he ended up being 75th centile for weight! Also, DS's combined centiles being he is actually on 88th centile for weight! Surely we don't need to worry about his weight already? He is sturdy but certainly not overweight and generally eats very healthily bar a biscuit most days (he is very very active so I don't mind him having the odd treat given that all his meals are healthy and he only has fruit for dessert).

Overweight children are more likely to grow into overweight adults, which is why there is so much focus on healthy eating at school. That doesn't mean that all overweight children become overweight adults though, it's more that eating and exercise habits can get ingrained early. I would ask your respective parents whether you or your dh were tubbier as small children as it might be the growth pattern that one of you followed too.

There are calculators you can use on height, I seem to recall that most children at two are half the height they will be when full grown which would work out as 178 cm or 5'10", if you include your ds's exact age, then the prediction is 5'8", if you do it purely on your height and your dh's height then it comes out as 5'10" again. All these are inexact of course, but they give you a general idea. According to Wikipedia the average height of an adult male in the UK is 5'9" and a women is 5'3". So it looks like your son is likely to be averagely tall as an adult.

Nooka, is 75th centile overweight?

no offence nooka but that is ridiculous. DD1 and me would be past 6'5" and DD2 probably even taller. (I am not and hope that DDs won't either!)
it doesn't match with most adults I know either.

for the weight, he could have very heavy bones. there is also plenty of chubby babies who end up quite skinny.
I don't think you can tell for sure.
the rule are if you can see/guess the rib cage of your DS he is not overweight.

No. I was a very short child but ended up above average height for this country.

MY nephew (now 21) was consistently the shortest boy in his class throughout primary school, and suddenly started to grow very quickly at around 12 -13. He is now approx 6 ft (same height as his father)and taller than many of his peers. The 2x height at age 2 theory may apply in some cases, but there are far too many exceptions to make it a reliable rule IMO.

Whatabout his weight? Is 75ht centile seems to be overweight??

I was a tiny weeny thing until a teenager and now I'm a normal 5'5'', 9 stone.

My little brother was a right fat jabba when he was a toddler and now he's a 6'4'' racing snake!!!

Does he look overweight?

I remember being told a long time ago that for boys they are roughly half their adult height when they are 2 (24 months). For girls, I think I was told that they are roughly half their adult height at 18 months. I think this gives a rough idea rather than a definite height though!

I don't know about weight though - I'm not sure you can use centiles to judge whether he is overweight or not since they only tell you his weight in comparison to other children rather than relating that to a healthy weight. I would use mamaloco's method to assess whether he is overweight.

No, I measured my son on his second birthday and according to that old wives tale he would only be about five foot four.

I found a better one online, I will try and find it for you... you can enter in mother's height, father's height, child's weight AND age in months AND the child's present height.

I got a prediction of five 9 for my son which seemed more what I would have expected.

there's an even more accurate one than this, where you can enter the child's height and age in months, can't find it right now though

no, he doesn't look overweight at all. Sturdy but not overweight. He eats very healthily, there isn't much I could cut down on. The only unhealthy thing he has is a biscuit most days.

Well in that case, I really wouldn't be concerned. The charts are ust a guide, after all, and can be trumped by common sense.

Load of cobblers - my sister was over an inch taller than me at 2 yrs old (and every other age) but I overtook her (by mm!!) at 17 - we;re both 5ft 10 now...and probably shrinking!

<a class="break-all" href="http://pediatrics.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=www.keepkidshealthy.com/welcome/yahtpredictor.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">good height predictor

They will be what they will be. Relax. Can depend on lots of factors, hormones kicking in early or late, height/weight can also be inherited from grand parents and further down the line.

DD was always around the 75th line for weight and still is, it isn't overweight.

Yes she looks chubbier than 75% of her peers, may not always be when she is an adult. Not sure what I could have done differently apart from trying to starve her. She is about 40th for height but at one point was 75th.

I've got no idea what height or weight my 2 yr old is. My dad keeps trying to measure her but she won't stay still long enough!

I'm tall, so is dh but the majority of the rest of my family are midgets vertically challenged. So, we'll just have to wait and see won't we?

I used the predictors that Valerie has linked to. There are some more complex ones, but essentially it's likely that Gangle's ds is going to be fairly average height. My children got a prediction of 6'1", and judging their subsequent growth I suspect they won't be far off. Normal growth patterns are fairly predictable, with the biggest growth in the first two years. Weight is much more variable.

Gaahhhh!! Just remeasured DS and he is infact 92cm which makes him over 50th centile for height so not short at all! They must have measured him wrong. All that worry for nothing!

There's so little difference between the centiles that a few cm can make a difference between 50th & 75th! I always find that my 2 (who are usually very skinny indeed) tend to bulk up before they suddenly grow out of all their jeans, so he might be gearing up for a growth spurt.

You're right letsblow this. I put a pair of jeans on him this morning that he last wore in late spring and which I used to have to turn up, and now they're slightly above his ankles so he's definitely growing! Same with weight - even half a pound seems to make a difference.

Hi there,
Don't worry about his weight.

Just encourage healthy eating habits and healthy "active" habits (I find this strange as my experience is that 2 year olds are active, well mine are..!)- I think what that really means is don't plonk them in front of the T.V. all day and make sure they have lots of running around outside time.

Oh yes, and make sure he gets a good night's sleep- think latest research showed less sleep as a toddler could make you overweight later in life!

I tried the second height predictor that Valium linked to and it said that DD will be just 168cm tall- how likely is that when now she's around 90% for height plus I'm 5'8" and DH is 6'?

Weird.