# Can you grow taller as an adult? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 20, 2008, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441 "2008-02-20T22:13:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2015, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/41 "2015-02-02T14:57:03Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Isilder** : > > AT WHAT AGE ? > > If 20 or 21… fine… maybe it was growth of the bones… which might have happened anyway. Yeah, I don’t know the precise age, but it would have been sometime in that vicinity, so presumably her growth plates hadn’t quite fused yet. Still rather after most folks have gotten their full adult height, though, and I understand it was quite a surprise. ---
**Author:** ![Randolph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Randolph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Randolph)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2016, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/44 "2016-01-26T22:13:48Z")
[Jeffrey Hudson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Hudson) more than doubled in height after he turned 30. Of course, he grew from [18 inches to 45 inches tall](https://books.google.com/books?id=Img7AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA438&lpg=PA438&dq=jeffrey+hudson#v=onepage&q=jeffrey%20hudson&f=false), but still, that’s quite a relative change. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2016, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/45 "2016-01-26T23:05:46Z")
From what limited info I have, I can tell you the age of “no taller” is not uniform. Probably, most of us have reached our permanent height by the time we could vote, but not everybody. It’s seldom documented, except in athletes. Most players are measured as freshpeople, and the media guides use that same number all through school, in order to lowball the opponents. They aren’t fooled for long, though. When a 6’2" player walks up to the guy whose published height is 6’1", he can easily tell he’s now 6’5". Some colleges reportedly even use the kid’s high school height and weight. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2016, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/46 "2016-01-27T03:05:47Z")
This thread has been revived more times than _Guys and Dolls_. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Seahorses44256](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ba8739/32.png) [@Seahorses44256](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seahorses44256)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2017, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/47 "2017-10-06T17:48:44Z")
YES, YOU CAN GROW TALLER AS AN ADULT!! I did. I am a female, and I was 5’5" from junior high until my early 30s, and at my late 30s, I am now a solid 5’7". I used to always be the same height as my sister. During my mid 30s, every once in a while I would get this strange hunger, like if I didn’t eat some meat and potatoes, I was going to feel sick or punch someone. It was a weird strong hunger, so I went to the gyno to check my hormones, but everything was normal. In retrospect, those were probably growth spurt hunger pains. Also, when checking my measurements, my hips got just a little bigger. My first instinct was to get mad that I was getting fat. But upon double checking, I had the same shallow fat layer on my hips, and it wasn’t deeper. So it just left me confused. My sister who used to be the same height, all the sudden I realized that I had to slightly look down when talking to her. Also what’s weird is that I had been an A cup chest size my whole life, but in one year in my late 30s I grew naturally from an A to a D, and had to spend a lot of money buying new undergarments. So when I recently happened to go to a doctor’s office who actually measures patients, instead of just relying on the patients to tell them how tall they are, low and behold, I’m 5’7". I could not believe it. I went home and double checked over and over again, and it was really true. I have heard off hand of women growing taller when they are pregnant, maybe because of the natural extra growth hormone in their bodies. But I have never been pregnant. Also, I have never done weight exercises, or taken exercise supplements. I only do girly exercise like treadmill walking and light exercise videos. I guess my body decided that I hadn’t finished growing when I was 13, so it just wanted to pick up and finish it off from where it left off. I don’t have any medical or health problems either. My posture is and has always been the same, and I do not have back or joint problems. The really bizarre thing, is when I have mentioned this to people who work in or around the medical industry, they get so mean and defensive to me! They roll their eyes, or laugh and make fun of me, or say my doctor just didn’t measure right. And they just keep repeating like a dead robot: “that-is-not-possible…my-textbook-says-growth-plates-fuse-in-the-teenage-years… that-is-not-possible…my-textbook-says-growth-plates-fuse-in-the-teenage-years…” They’re so weird. Whatever rusty old textbook that is - which probably came from one of those old textbooks that advises bloodletting, or cigarette smoking to clear up a head cold - they really should update it every once in a while with more modern current information. It should more accurately state that “it is very uncommon to grow in height after the teen years, but it can occasionally occur”. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2017, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/48 "2017-10-06T22:18:01Z")
> [@tremorviolet](#): > > When I graduated high school I was 5’ 4.75" measured by a drs office. In 2003, at age 35, I was again measured by a drs office and I was 5’ 5.25". I just got back from a new doctor this morning and I was measured at 5’ 5.75"! I made them do it twice 'cause I was so surprised. That’s a variation of from 0.76% to 1%. It’s most likely due to the measurements being taken by different nurses, at different times of the day. I once went to 3 different doctors in the same medical complex all in the same morning, and at each one a nurse weighed me & measured my height. Both my height & weight varied by 1-2% over these measurements. I expect that is typical for such measurements – they don’t need to be more accurate than that for the doctor to asses your health. ---
**Author:** ![glowacks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/glowacks/32/5548_2.png) [@glowacks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glowacks)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2017, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/49 "2017-10-07T05:00:32Z")
You can (or at least, could in the past in Japan) get silicone implanted in your scalp to make you a few cm taller like this guy did. > **[Mainoumi Shūhei](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainoumi_Sh%C5%ABhei)** > > Mainoumi Shūhei (born 17 February 1968 as Shūhei Nagao) is a former sumo wrestler from Aomori, Japan. His highest rank was komusubi. During the 1990s he was one of the most popular wrestlers in sumo due to his wide variety of techniques and great fighting spirit in battling opponents nearly twice his size. > Born in Ajigasawa, Nagao was an amateur sumo champion at Nihon University, where he studied economics. He originally wanted to be a teacher, but decided to join professional sumo in honour o... ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2017, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/50 "2017-10-08T10:46:36Z")
Posture is the same ? Well, you think so… but… the details of the spine’s shape can change When you are young, you use your arms for dancing and waving, and not much else. this leaves the muscles down the back of the neck to be weak . When you are mature doing mature things like shopping, child lifting, office work, you use your shoulders more and develop muscles to pull the neck back… taller ! Also, as you age, you wear the bones and cartilage of the spine, and can free it up to be less curved… taller ! Also, the muscles of the lower back can become larger, if only with fat, and that is holding the lower back a bit further backward… straight… taller. its NOT growth. growth as a mature adult, eg 25+ , is an illness. You’d have to develop deformity. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2017, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441/51 "2017-10-09T23:36:25Z")
> [@Isilder](#): > > When you are young, you use your arms for dancing and waving, and not much else… This is a very genial image. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-you-grow-taller-as-an-adult/438441.md?page=2)