There are a lot of wives’ tales about growing taller. Stretching, hanging from a bar, and even pills. One such theory many believe in is jumping to actually make you taller? Yes! The act of jumping to make you taller is believed by many to increase height.
Does jumping make you taller? The act of jumping as high as you can or even jumping rope alone does not make you taller. Where people get confused is that it is not the activity that makes you taller it is the exercise that helps with healthy joints and muscles which aid in helping a child or teenager grow. An active lifestyle while maintaining a healthy diet plus good genetics all can help reach your maximum genetic potential in height.
Many people in the country of China also believe playing basketball makes you taller. If you want more on this topic, click here to view Can playing basketball make you taller?|What the Science says In the link you will find information that will help you in understanding what’s possible when it comes to becoming tall.
If you are interested in checking out the best basketball equipment and accessories then you can find them by Clicking Here! The link will take you to Amazon.com
Jumping to make you taller
From first-hand experience growing up, I love to dunk, I would jump and dunk on lower rims all of the time, practicing my favorite dunks that I just saw in the slam dunk contests from the NBA. I am eventually able to jump fairly high for my height, dunking on almost 9 feet by the time I reached the age of 14 at a height of 5 feet 7 inches tall.
But jumping alone is very doubtful that it made me any taller, you see my brother who is two years older than me, barely did any jumping or played any sport or involved himself in any activity when he was younger. His activities were video games, and lots of them, he was the lazy type and still is. But I was athletic, my brother wasn’t. Who do you think is taller?
He is by an inch. I’m 5’9 he’s 5’10, Is it safe to say that jumping does not make you taller? Well, no I wasn’t a test subject, I was just one case. But I did many things that are supposed to help with growing taller, I just didn’t know it at the time. Maybe it did help me grow taller and If I didn’t do those things I may have been shorter, who knows.
I didn’t eat healthily but neither did my brother so we are equal in that category. I did drink a lot of milk as I was told it makes you grow taller, my brother didn’t, more on that later. I didn’t grow up obsessing to be taller, I was the middle of the pack when compared to my classmates. Even if I obsessed with what could I have done, there isn’t any new research in the matter now than there was back then. Meaning there have been no real big scientific breakthroughs that suggest doing this.
There are countless pills and supplement on the market that grantee to grow taller, and that is one thing I regret is not taking a multivitamin as a kid. I am sure that could have helped in my overall health for the lack of a good diet. Would it have made me grow taller? Who knows, but it would have been good to take.
What will make you grow taller?
- Stretching
- Eating healthy
- Exercise
- Good genetics
- Good posture
This is all fine and dandy but the list above is useless if your growth plates in your femur have closed. The growth plates are also known as the epiphyseal plate and are the area at the end of the long bone. Each of these long bones has two growth plates at each end that are responsible for growth in adolescent children. Once this soft tissue hardens, that means that you are done growing. The epiphyseal plate is responsible for how long that the long bone will grow.
Even after doing everything right, it is still possible to not grow any taller. A friend of mine is 6 feet 4 inches tall and plays basketball, he has a younger brother who is 5 feet 7 inches tall were talking about 30-year-olds now all done growing. A nine-inch difference in height. if you were wondering if they have different dads from what they tell me is no, they have the same dad. That’s just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes. They were both physically active and were much alike growing up. For the smaller brother unfortunately it just didn’t happen that he would grow to be tall.
Genetics
Short people hate this word and you may even see this and completely disregard this section cause you don’t want to hear it. I am always baffled that we were able to go to the moon but we haven’t found a cure for baldness or height. We made all types of transportation vehicles, cars, planes, boats etc. and it was only in the early 2000s when Hanes clothing line came out with the first tagless tee-shirt…How is it we haven’t figured this out yet?
Back to genetics, this is really the deciding factor, there are many cases even in the NBA, Michael Jordan is a classic example of a growth spurt growing from just under 6 feet to 6 feet 6 inches tall in his senior year of high school when his brothers were all under 6 feet and even his father. Michael credits the height growth from hanging from a bar and stretching himself out that way, Jeremy Lin went through the same thing and said he hung from a bar also. Maybe we all should just hang from a bar so that our limbs dangle and gravity is pulling them to the floor and stretching us out.
Is hanging from a bar going to work? I don’t know but researchers say it’s very good for posture and help with getting back the height you may have lost due to the compression of your spine. You may have heard you are taller in the morning than you are before bed. Lying down or hanging from a bar can recover the height you have lost from your spine being compressed due to gravity while doing your everyday activities throughout the day.
The research available says that hanging from a bar will not result in growing taller but recover any height you may have lost. Smaller individuals can lose up to a quarter of an inch before bed and taller individuals up to half an inch. Not much really.
What about hanging upside down?
Nothing suggests that hanging upside down would be any better or help you grow taller. Hanging upside down is good for back problems, though you don’t want to hang upside down too long because blood flows to the brain and too much of it can make you pass out.
More on Genetics…
A father’s genetics will usually determine the height of the child. Tall men usually have tall children but they only get a percentage of their father’s height. The rest is up to the human body to determine the height. This is why it is important to do the following…
What about jumping rope?
Again I have been there done that, I was in a jump rope club from elementary on to junior high. Very doubtful the jump rope helped me grow very much, but I can’t discredit something that didn’t work for me. It may work for you. It does promote exercise which is important and promotes healthy bones and joints. As a basketball player you should be jumping rope regularly anyway, there are so many benefits with this one exercise.
Bad Posture Can affect your height?
I never had good posture I slouch over when I am on the computer sitting on a chair. This is where this could be the reason why my brother is taller than me. I specifically remember having bad posture, but it wasn’t anything people pointed and laugh at me about. But bad posture can hinder height growth, think about it your back is slouched over, the body is in a slouched position, which can prevent you from getting taller.
There are many people who report that when they were able to fix their bad posture they were able to grow up to two inches in height because of it. So if your young and in the prime of your growth spurt get that posture fixed immediately.
Does Milk help you grow taller?
There is another belief that milk makes you grow taller. We all grew up believing that milk is healthy and it is but it was if it was this magical drink that made you tall, strong, and indestructible. We see ads to drink milk all the time on TV commercials and even leave it for Santa with some cookies as if to say that was his gasoline to get him through the Christmas night.
While milk does have a lot of calcium and calcium is good for the bones, studies prove otherwise that milk is a miracle worker for increasing one’s height. milk isn’t as helpful as a person would believe. There was a study done in 2018 that followed a handful of participants from birth to 17 years of age that drank milk every day. They discovered a height difference of 0.39 cm. For the little increase in height, there were too many variables that would need to be taken into account. Consistency of drinking the milk, daily diet, activity, and the individual, what works for one may not work for all. The study was a small one with no definitive answers.
Through my experience I grew up and drank a lot of milk and still do, I am still average in height and no taller than my brother who didn’t drink any milk. I don’t even know if he likes milk. I did everything right compared to him and still an inch shorter. Well, not everything, my posture suck, and I could have used a multivitamin.
So why do people believe jumping will make you taller?
The only logic I could come up with as to why people believe that jumping makes you taller is that it promotes physical activity and exercise which is important. Those that play professional basketball and volleyball require a lot of jumping in the sport and tend to have much taller players on average that play their respective game.
Or maybe they believe as they are jumping from the ground they are jumping against gravity as to say gravity is pulling them, stretching and pulling on their legs until they reach back onto the ground.