The world health organization says he's fine.

Click this. It's the World Health Organization's growth chart for boys, birth to age 2. This one is for weight. There's another for height. There are still others for girls, weight and height. Orren is in the 50th percentile for weight, worldwide. Yup, completely average. He's still off the charts for height, no matter what chart you look at, but this one puts his weight totally average. Just as I thought.

I think it's so easy to get bogged down in percentiles. Everyone loves to brag about how their kid is 90th percentile in everything, or whatever. Of course I think it's funny when people talk about how very tall their babies are and they're shorter and older than Orren. (OK, so this is kind of a given, being that he's in the 97th percentile for height. I still find it funny.) So Orren may be very tall, but on the AAP charts (NOT the WHO charts I linked above), he's only in the 35th percentile for weight. This would not be a concern if he was in the 50th for height or anything, but since he's at the very top of the chart for height, and below average for weight, apparently this raises flags, and we're now supposed to fatten him up.

On the way home, I thought to myself about this, and it occurred to me that percentiles are a real crock of shit. All it does is compare you to other people, and what does that tell you about where you should be? Absolutely nothing. Just for kicks, I had my own percentiles calculated, and as it turns out, I'm in roughly the 15th percentile for weight, and the 78th for height. I'm not some freak. I'm 110 pounds at 5'6". 40 years ago, this would have probably put me in the 50th percentile for weight (although probably the 85th for height since Americans have gotten taller over the years). So basically, all this says to me is that while I have never considered myself particularly tall, I am by comparison to others, and not shockingly, I'm also very thin compared to others. Why should it be cause for concern that my son is also tall and thin compared to his peers? I can't think of one good reason why I this should raise a red flag. If anything, I'd file it under "Predictable".

What's more, America is in the midst of an obesity epidemic, one which is affecting children at an alarming rate. Walk around downtown El Paso for five minutes, and you'll see more fat kids than normal ones. Taking this into account, it should be taken as a compliment that our kid stacks up tall and slim next to this lot!