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When do girls stop growing (height)

100K views 53 replies 40 participants last post by  ChristaN 
#1 ·
Dd11 (soon to be 12) is quickly approaching my height. Her feet are a size 7 in women's shoes, but they haven't grown at all in the past 9-12 months, so I think that they are done growing. She wears the same shoe size I do, but mine were a 6.5 pre-kids and spread a half size after having kids, so they are a bit bigger than mine were as a teen.

She doesn't really want to be taller than me (5'4") and I'd be shocked if she was, but given how tall she's gotten (5'2"), I'm begining to wonder if she will surpass me in size. As I recall, I was done growing by 14, but I do think that there was some growth btwn 12 and 14.

From a background standpoint, I am very, very tall in my family. Most of the women range from 4'10" to 5'1" and the men, save for my father who is 5'10.5", are btwn 5'4" and 5'9". Dh is 5'6" and his parents were both 5'4". His family is 100% Italian and there are few, if any, not short people.

Dd is early in the puberty process. She's grown 7" in the past two years, but she still only weighs 84lbs and isn't tremendously developed physically.
 
#2 ·
we were just discussing this last night.

i think that's about right. i think i stopped growing around 14 myself and i think most girls stop growing during the early teens. or should i saw SLOOOOOOOOOOWs down early teens. right when the boys take off.


also i have noticed in my xh's family the ones who were predominantly meat eaters and sportspeople who played a lot of sports were 2 to 6 inches taller than the rest of the family. are those two things coincidental? i dont know. but my ex's love of meat and playing sports on a regular basis far outdoes the rest of his family which is shorter than him. however in distance relatives they are tall people. so maybe recessive genes?
 
#4 ·
Going in to 8th grade my best friend was a good 5 inches taller than me. By beginning of 9th, we were the same height. I am 5'2" now.
 
#6 ·
i think the growing is absolutely DONE by 16 or so; mostly done by 14?... i seem to remember being in the same size clothes from about age 14 until i had my first child, but i hit my adult height shortly after i turned 16. i only know this because of what my learner's permit and original driver's licenses say (5'6" at age 15 and 5'7" at age 16...but i'm 5'8").

i imagine it differs greatly from family to family.

have you ever played around with the height predictor calculator? here's one that goes up to age 12. it says my sons will be 6'3"!!
 
#7 ·
My dd is 16.5. She seemed to slow waaaay down after 13 and her feet before that. However, when we put them against grandma's garage wall last week she had grown about an inch from the same time last year. And I know she was standing up staraight as her brother had just hit 13 (14 now) and was trying his best to be taller last year. He is now
 
#8 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by MusicianDad View Post
I'm not positive but I think the average is between 12 and 15 years.
That sounds right to me. I remember being 5'6" at 12, and I grew another inch and a half taller at some point. Rain says, "Twelve" and her memory tends to be better than mine for stuff like this... well, for most stuff, to be honest.
 
#10 ·
The general rule is they stop or slow down around the time they start their periods. Obviously, we all know acceptions.

I was fully grown at 13. My DD is 13, my height with bigger hands and feet. She's still shooting up (has grown 3 inches this year) and hasn't started her period yet. She's built like DH's family and all his sisters continued to grow until 16 or 17 and they are all very tall (5'8" to 6'.) My nieces all kept growing through most of high school.

Most of DD's friends have either stopped or slowed down dramatically.
 
#11 ·
I grew after age 16 - a bit, probably 1/2 or 3/4 inch. I was mostly done at 14. I know several young woman who grew in college. One added only 1/2 inch but the others grew 2 inches or more! The 2 that grew more than 2 inches were seriously late hitting puberty. They both looked like skinny little kids until 17. Those that grew 2 inches were more typical age at puberty and had normal to stocky builds.

My dd is 5'3" a month shy of 12. My family has some tall genes, but dh's family is quite short. We're guessing anywhere between 5'6" and 5'9". Her female cousin is 5'11" at age 17 and her male cousin is 6'2" at just turned 15!
 
#14 ·
I was in the 8th grade, so 13-14. Five foot six.

I was also still about 82 pounds at that point.

It's funny to tell people that in the 8th grade I was the same height I am now, but I weighed almost 50 pounds less.
 
#15 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by whatsnextmom View Post
The general rule is they stop or slow down around the time they start their periods. Obviously, we all know acceptions.
This. Puberty stops around the time AF starts so you are about your adult size when you start AF. However with all the chemicals and hormones in food, things are a little skewed.

I was about 15 when AF started, and I was 5'6. I'm 5'8 now, so 2 inches in 11 years!
 
#17 ·
Our doctor said that a good rule of thumb was to count on only another inch or inch and a half after a girl started her period. This has held true for both my daughter and myself. We were 13 though. I am curious to see how this works out with my niece, who is 5'9'' at age 11 and just started her period.
 
#19 ·
All I know is DD woke up last week and she was four inches taller overnight! (Well ok, not over night, but with in a month or two she went from being under the 4'9 and 80 lbs to being 5'0 and 95 lbs). I think she is getting close to done though.
 
#21 ·
My daughter seemed to stop growing for a few years in jr high. But, then she must have had a small growth spurt in the last year. (she's almost 18)

I am extremely tall, but her dad is short-ish. So, it could have gone either way. I didn't stop growing until about 18. However, I didn't start growing until 14. My daughter has always grown steadily except for 5-7th grade, when she seemed almost stunted for a while.
 
#22 ·
My eldest DD, 20, is 5'8" and feels she stopped growing around 18/19. It was that final inch, she was 5'7" by 15. DD #2 will be thirteen at the end of September and is about 5'1'', (DD #1 was quite a bit taller at that age), and is in early puberty (I guess she is a late bloomer), and I am sure she has some growing left, but I doubt she will be as tall as her sister.
 
#23 ·
The height calculators put her at 5'6" as a final adult height which would be shocking given her genetic potential, honestly. She'd be as tall as her dad and a good 2-8 inches taller than all of the women on both sides of the family.

I've heard, and recall, that about stopping growing around the time you get your period. I got mine around 14 and was done growing right around the same time, so that sounds right. I do suspect that dd has a while before she gets to that degree of physical development, so I have wondered if she is going to keep up this massive growth spurt that we've seen over the past two years.

I guess that we'll see in a year or two if she is destined to be the giant of the family (like I am, at 5'4", in our family!).
 
#24 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by ChristaN View Post
I've heard, and recall, that about stopping growing around the time you get your period.
if that was true then i would have been a midget. i started at 10.5

also another thing i found in my family. you cant really predict the family's height... if they are not all the same height. both my gpas were over 6 feet and my grammas not too much beyond 4 feet. our cousins came out all varied sizes whether we had tall parents or not.

so i think with recessive genes we cant really predict our children's height.
 
#25 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by meemee View Post
so i think with recessive genes we cant really predict our children's height.
The weird thing is that our "tall" recessive genes are those people who aren't really short. My dad and I are the only people for multiple generations (as far back as anyone can recall) who aren't quite short. I am 5'4" and my dad is 5'10.5". Every other man on both dh's side of the family and mine going back to great-grandparents is btwn 5'2" and 5'8". All of the women, save for me and one grandma, are btwn 4'10" and 5'1" (again both sides of the family for a few generations).
 
#26 ·
Not sure how accurate they are but there are multiple sites on the net where you can input your child's age, weight and height right now and it will tell you approx how tall they will end up being. The older they are the more accurate they are from what I have read.

I like this one cause it allows you to input exact age http://pediatrics.about.com/gi/dynam...predictor.html
 
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