My DS (12) has a lovely group of friends that moved up from primary to secondary with him this year. But they have all shot up in height and filled out in the last year - all are 12 years old but now wearing age 14/15 clothes. DS is very slim and according to growth charts is spot on average height for his age. His friends are all towering above him as are some of the other boys in his year. He really looks small compared to them and gets lots of comments about how small he is.
So DS is now really sensitive about his height and frame. He keeps asking me how he can get more muscles and tells me that the boys (not his friendship group) say he is small and weak. It’s totally knocked his confidence.
He loves football and plays to a good level but when I watched him play at school sports day last week I noticed he seemed really withdrawn and his body language just screamed that he had no confidence in himself - all the other boys in the team are much bigger than he is. It was pretty heartbreaking to see him like that. We had a chat on the way home and he told me that he’s too small and weak to compete with the bigger boys and he is scared that he will get hurt as they tend to go in hard on him because he is ‘small’.
I have reassured him that his turn to grow will come, and not to get too hung up on being smaller than the others. I was small and skinny and completely flat chested at the same age and had the exact same experience at school - but I ended up taller and curvier than most of my classmates. But that’s easy to say and clearly doesn’t help him be confident now.
Has anyone else been through this with their DS/DD? Can you offer any suggestions for helping to boost his confidence or strategies for helping him through? I am really worried he is just going to refuse to play sport because he feels too small and that would be such a shame for such a sporty kid.