I've never really ate a healthy diet. I never took vitamins routinely. I don't think I really get the proper nutrients(I hardly get any protein at all) And ya wanna know why? lol, It's a really dumb reason. But...has anyone seen those commercials for the Flinestone's vitamins?? The commercial song goes, "...we're building strong, and growing." And it shows these little kids running up to a measuring chart, seeing how tall they are, all giddy and everything, and it scared me!! The Flinestones commercial scared me!! lol. It made me think that if I took vitamins and had a nutritious diet I'd suddenly grow really tall and be a giant. And I don't want that so I didn't eat healthy.
But now I really want to eat better. It might give me more energy or something plus everyones been on my back about it. But I'm afraid eating better and taking vitamins will make me grow. I'm 16(17 soon :) ) so I don't know if I'm done growing yet and if nutrition will influence my growth. I haven't grown any since I was 12 or 11, is that because I didn't eat right after that? I'm afraid that if I eat right now I'll begin to grow again because I didn't eat right before and the sudden healthy stuff inside me will make me grow. Any truth to that?

I know it's dumb lol, but I need to know before I take vitamins and other healthy things. So, will eating right make me grow since I didn't eat right before? Like the nutritions I get now will make up for my lack of nutritions before and kind of wake up whatever made me stop growing before and make me start to grow again since I'm 16?? Or maybe do you think that I'm completly done growing since I haven't grown in 6 years and I'm almost 17, and eating right won't change that??
Basically, if a soon to be 17 year old girl suddenly starts to eat a healthy diet and takes vitamins after years of not eating right, will she grow any after 6 years of not growing?? My friend said that since I didn't grow any in 6 years I'm done growing and eating better won't change that, but that dang Flinestones commercial lol. So, would I grow??

Anything anyone has to say is really appreciated! I know it sounds stupid lol, but it's important to me. Hope this post made some sense :)

:D

Well, I'm not a nutritionist, but as far as I know, all vitamins and a healthy diet will do is make your body it's BEST version of itself. Your skin, hair, weight, and yes, your height, will be what it is supposed to be, without the handicap of poor health and poor nutrition. I believe things like growth spurts are determined by your heredity and your hormones?

*calling KT or any other fitness wise women???*


Also, you will have strong bones, thereby reducing your chances of ending up being five inches shorter when you are 70. :shock:

Ok, please don't take this as gospel or anything, I am not a nutritionalist, however you do need to eat healthy to stay healthy. This is the battle I have with my son, he is tired all the time. :(

Good news is, my son will be 17 in May, and even without eating as he should and taking medicine that generally slows growth down, he is at the height he should be for his age. When he was young and as he was growing their where ways to figure out how tall you will be at adulthood. We figured him at 6', give or take an inch....he is at 5'10.5" now and still has a couple of growth yrs yet. So not eating well did nothing to his height.

From things that I heard, females genarally stopped growing a couple of yrs after the onset of menstruation. They also won't grow past the age of 18 as far as I know. I went into HS at 5'6" and 4 yrs later was just slightly under 5'10".

I don't really think you need to worry, however if you really want to know, go to your doctor and have a thorough checkup and have them recommend a nutritionalist.

HTH!! :rolleyes:

Hi Strawberry Shortcake! :) Well.......I will tell you that in America (I'm assuming you are in America), or any westernized nation, that it's virtually impossible to "not grow", even with a crappy diet. If you are not growing, I would suspect it's because you actually don't eat hardly at all. That would definitely stunt your growth.

IF that is the case, there is a lot more going on with you, and I would suggest you seek medical attention.

If that's not the case, you may just be naturally very small. You didn't mention the size of your other family members. That would be very telling.

Eating healthy is not complicated, nor will you grow to unbelievable proportions. In VERY simplified terms, stick to whole grain products (that means NO white-flour products -- strictly whole wheat bread, pasta, brown rice, etc...). Eat lowfat and nonfat dairy products. Eat lean meats (not fatty meats). Some good lean meat: white meat turkey, poultry, fish, very lean red meat, egg whites. A small handful of nuts a day is great also. Of course, eat LOTS AND LOTS of fruits and vegetables. These should make up the bulk of your "snacking" time. Cut out, or highly reduce, sodas - even diet sodas. Eat candy and other junk foods only RARELY.

These are just simple guidelines, but making these changes could give you much more energy, and you will improve internally as well. You can easily do lots of internet searches and gather some great info. Hope this helps! :D

Well the only fact I have about that is that I had a growth spurt when I was 16, I grew my last inch at that time.

I wasn't eating any better then though.

I think it's just better to eat well and not worry about growing.

Why wouldn't you want to grow?

If you haven't grown any since 12, then your done growing. Taller at least. If you don't keep bones good and strong with a good foundation as a teen, then you will SHRINK starting in your midlife. Shrinking from bone loss and spine compression.

Desiring healthy shiny hair is a great motivator for improving your diet. Start small and build from there. Don't make too many changes all at once or it will be discouraging. Take care of the biggest and worst things first. Like pop - awful terrible stuff for your heath. Just drink water. Add more fresh food. And start educating yourself. Have fun!

Don't take this the worng way please. But why don't you want to grow? Why do you want to stay the same size since you were 12? That is not healthy, actually that is very unhealthy.

I the reason why I couldn't eat right is because I couldn't. There was no food to eat!

The fact that I can now buy myself food, since I have my own job, and people offering me free meals fills me with joy.
Children need to grow, they grow more than adults. I can tell, if you have not grown since you were 12 your growth may be perminately stunted because of it. That adds to health problems. I doubt you'll grow much even if you did start to eat right. As a matter of fact I lost hair form not eating right.

I cannot grow more than 5'3" (in height) now because I didn't get the proper nutrition in my younger years. I am taking all the vitamins I can get to make up for it, all the protein, all the nutrients I missed. No it will not make you a giant. No you will not be over weight if you are eating correctly. And yes it will benefit your health.

People die from not eating correctly and I almost did because I was barely fed.

Don't take this like I'm attacking you, but that is no such thing to be afraid of. You need to eat right, especially if you can.

Before reading on, please bear in mind that I am not a professional. I have university degrees involving elements of both physcial anthropology and genetics, and I am a keen amateur student of health, fitness and nutrition, and so I am well researched, but nevertheless, I am not qualified in any way.

Don't take this the worng way please. But why don't you want to grow? Why do you want to stay the same size since you were 12? That is not healthy, actually that is very unhealthy.


Kitty Brite - it is a very good question as to why S_S doesn't want to grow any more, but it isn't true that not growing after 12 isn't healthy. Your growth pattern is connected to your hormones, puberty and so on, as well as to your genetic potential and your environment (including diet). You pretty much stop growing a year or two after your first period (you might grow a bit more after that, but nothing noticeable - the changes from then on will be more to do with shape and body composition rather than height), and as you know, the timing of menarche varies enormously. Personally I had my first when I was 10, and was fully grown by the age of 11, and believe me, I am very healthy indeed :) Small, but very healthy.

S_S - if you are 16/17 now, you probably won't grow anyway, whatever your diet is like. And it is highly unlikely that you were so bad that you didn't grow properly when you were younger. It is virtually impossible to eat that badly in the Western world - the one thing your body needs a lot of when it is growing is energy, and most Western diets have plenty of calories, in fact often too many calories LOL! They might not be the ideal calories, but they are still energy and so you will still have grown to your genetic potential.

Having said that, now is a very good time to start taking care of your diet. It won't make you grow, but a healthy diet has a myriad of other benefits too long to list here. A very short sample of these benefits would include lots of energy, a healthy weight, nice skin, nails and hair, good eyesight, strong bones, healthy heart and a reduced risk of many many serious diseases such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease and so on.

So please don't worry about the giants in the commercial and start giving your body what it needs to make it the best it can possibly be. You only get one body so it makes sense for you to take the best possible care of it. Most people take better care of their cars and houses than they do of themselves, and you can always get a new house or car if you need to. You can't buy a new body if you ruin this one, so treat it like it is a very very expensive performance car, and put the best possible fuel you can in to get the best possible performance out :)

You might want to speak to a doctor or nutritionist about this too, because you seem to have some concerns that need to be addressed by a professional - I'm not being nasty or anything here, please don't be offended or insulted by this as I'm sincerely only trying to help, but from your post it sounds like a lot of your problems with a healthy diet are based in your mind not your body.

Take care of yourself sweetie, 17 is such a fun age, your life is just beginning :)

Holy mackerel, Sara, you've got issues girl!

First off, let me ask: Where do you live??? Hehe.

Okay, okay. I think that you have stunted your growth with poor eating habits. What do you mean by "grow"? As in taller, wider? Older?

I don't think eating healthy now will make up in growth for all the years you've been eating poorly. I think I quit growing taller when I was 18. Why don't you want to grow? It's normal. ;)

May I ask what a typical days meals consist of?

Eating better foods (fruits, veggies, whole grains) will improve your mental clarity, immune system, HAIR, skin... it effects everything, even how you sleep and your energy. Just because you don't want to grow isn't any reason to punish your body!

And I believe that those Flintstones commercials are just a sales tactic. They can say whatever they want to. The vitamins aren't going to make you a Green Giant mutant monster, just help you to grow into the mature lovely lady you were meant to be.

This may just be a quirk of my family heredity, but both my mother and I grew after the birth of our first child. I only grew an inch, no big deal, but mother grew four inches!!!! Of course that was back in 1960 for her, and she was only 16, so maybe she had growing to do anyway.
Vitamins will make you healthy, not growing. You will grow as much as you are supposed to. I have five kids, fed all of them vitamins until they refused them. Two are over six feet, two are five ten, one is five six. I am only five four. They grew to what they were supposed to, and my daughter who is six feet tall didn't eat ANYTHING!!!!!!! She to this day has about twelve things total she will eat. The girl who is five six ate healthy, took all her vitamins, and there she stays.
EAT WELL!!!! Vitamins and good food will not make you a giant, I promise!!!! It will give you pretty hair, though!!!! :D

Kitty Brite wrote:
Don't take this the worng way please. But why don't you want to grow? Why do you want to stay the same size since you were 12? That is not healthy, actually that is v

Kitty Brite - it is a very good question as to why S_S doesn't want to grow any more, but it isn't true that not growing after 12 isn't healthy.

I think you misunderstood what I said. ;)

I meant that not wanting to grow, and wanting the stay the same size since you were 12 isn't healthy. Not "not growing after you were 12 isn't healthy" See what I mean?

If she wasn't eating right before age 12 she might have been a pretty tiny 12 year old. Which means her growth was probably already stunted before she hit 12.

I'm not trying to sound mean either but refusing to eat right is basically what she said because she was afraid of becoming a giant.

You need to eat right to stay healthy, and that's not my definition of staying healthy. So that's why I said it was very unhealthy.

Just wanted to clear that up a bit. I'm not mad, or trying to shoot anyone down. :)

I think you misunderstood what I said. ;)

I meant that not wanting to grow, and wanting the stay the same size since you were 12 isn't healthy. Not "not growing after you were 12 isn't healthy" See what I mean?


Yes I do see what you mean. My apologies KB. I totally misread what you originally said and thought you meant that not growing after 12 was unhealthy. Rereading your post, it is now perfectly clear that you meant *not wanting* to grow after 12 was unhealthy.

This is what I get for trying to catch up on two days of posts in 5 minutes - everything in your post now makes perfect sense and I agree with it all :)

Thanks for pointing out my error in such a nice way BTW - now I just feel silly :oops:

However, the rest of my post, addressed at Strawberry, is still OK I hope - you summed it up perfectly 'You need to eat right to stay healthy'.

I think you misunderstood what I said. ;)

I meant that not wanting to grow, and wanting the stay the same size since you were 12 isn't healthy. Not "not growing after you were 12 isn't healthy" See what I mean?


Yes I do see what you mean. My apologies KB. I totally misread what you originally said and thought you meant that not growing after 12 was unhealthy. Rereading your post, it is now perfectly clear that you meant *not wanting* to grow after 12 was unhealthy.

This is what I get for trying to catch up on two days of posts in 5 minutes - everything in your post now makes perfect sense and I agree with it all :)

Thanks for pointing out my error in such a nice way BTW - now I just feel silly :oops:

However, the rest of my post, addressed at Strawberry, is still OK I hope - you summed it up perfectly 'You need to eat right to stay healthy'.

Nah you don't have to apologize. I read things differently too sometimes. I just didn't want to offend anyone by saying something wasn't healthy in my opinion, you know?
Sometimes what I say, I don't say it very clearly. I'm bad at writing, and explaining things ;)

I have no problem with what you said though. You did make perfect sense also. :D

StrawberryShortcake:

I will say that I personally grew a couple of inches in my 20's, going from 5'1" to 5'3", (whoohoo :rolleyes: )however, no significant growth normally happens by the time you reach 16 or 17. I'm also wondering why you have such an aversion to growing...are you already over six feet tall and don't want to be any taller? As someone who has always been very short due to my genetics (I beat my grandma by 3" and my aunt by 4"!!) I guess I can't relate to not wanting to be a little taller. It's definitely a tall person's world -- what with those high shelves and all... ;)

But eating healthier prevents SOOOOOOOOO many problems in the long run!!!! anemias, bone problems, your teeth falling out, your hair falling out, bad skin, maintaining your organ functions...and then there's the other nusances of not having energy, mental clarity etc etc. GO FOR IT!! Worst case scenario you grow one or two measely inches --trust, me you won't even notice the difference...

I'd love to agree that you quit growing after puberty, but I have evidence to the contrary:

I grew an inch in my early 20's. (I was living on canned ravoli and take-out at the time.)

My mother grew two inches after she had me.

My aunt grew an inch and a half in her late 20's.

My Grandfater grew three inches in his 50's. (His is shorter now due to the loss of his legs.)

Apparently, you can grow later in life...

Being tall is not a bad thing. Trust me--I am 5'4 and would give up much to be able to reach the top cabinet. Imagine spending the rest of your life looking pathetically at a tall person (my husband) and asking for someting you can't reach. Which is everything, everywhere; the short jokes alone are enough to make you want to commit murder.

--Cheryl

I'd love to agree that you quit growing after puberty, but I have evidence to the contrary.


You must be the exception that proves the rule :) Maybe it is hereditary/genetic, since several members of your family have grown in later life? That's soooooo cool - maybe there's hope for me and those high shelves yet LOL!

However, I think the main point here is that you are *unlikely* to grow *significantly*. By significantly I mean those 6" in a year growth spurts that teens often have around puberty. An inch here or there wasn't what I meant - I grew an inch sometime between leaving high school and now :) Some bones in your body don't stop growing and fusing until you are 20-30, such as the clavicle (collar bone) and sacrum (the fused vertebrae below your spine around your tailbone) - this is one of the ways I age skeletons in my archaeology studies, by comparing the pattern of fused and unfused bones throughout the body.

Also, I asked one of my instructors about this, and she mentioned that changes in posture can lengthen the spine, so that you are to all intents and purpose taller, but you haven't actually grown longer in any of your bones, you've just got less of a curve in your spine. Apparently people who have done jobs like carry heavy bags on their back or bending over a desk all day for many many years can appear to grow two or three inches taller when they retire becuase of this. Which is kinda neat too.

So clearly it isn't quite as simple as you grow in puberty and then stop, but puberty is when you tend to have your main gains in height, and spurt towards your adult size :)

Being tall is not a bad thing. Trust me--I am 5'4 and would give up much to be able to reach the top cabinet. Imagine spending the rest of your life looking pathetically at a tall person (my husband) and asking for someting you can't reach. Which is everything, everywhere; the short jokes alone are enough to make you want to commit murder.

--Cheryl

Haha! I hear that!!! My boyfriend bought me a step stool so I would be able to reach things while he's deployed. I still can't reach the very top shelves in the linen closet though!!! Right now, I keep all the sheets on the floor because I can';t put them away... :P

My boyfriend bought me a step stool so I would be able to reach things while he's deployed. I still can't reach the very top shelves in the linen closet though!!!

The only way I can reach the top cabinets is to STAND ON THE COUNTER. Not a good thing at 5 months pregnant. And my kitchen is tiny, so I can't put stuff anywhere else. ARRGH!!! I hate being short. (I'm the tallest female in my family too.)

--Cheryl

Haha! I hear that!!! My boyfriend bought me a step stool so I would be able to reach things while he's deployed. I still can't reach the very top shelves in the linen closet though!!! Right now, I keep all the sheets on the floor because I can';t put them away... :P

I hear ya!
I'm 5' 1.5", and I make my boyfriend keep all the things I don't like or shouldn't really eat on the top shelves - Marmite, Branston pickle, cookies and so on. I have to bring a chair from the dining table through to the kitchen if I want to get anything down from the top shelves.

I alos work in a wholefoods shop on a Saturday, and I have a special set of steps so I can stock the top shelves :)

Wow, replies :D Thanks everyone!

First I want ot make some stuf clear, I think what I said in my first post may have came off as un-clear. Things always make such perfect sense in my head then when I try to to type it out all the words go scatter lol. Maybe I eat more healthy than I thought. It's just when I think of a healthy diet, I think of that food pyramid. You know that pyramid that says eat like 7 servings of veggies, 9 diary products and all that other stuff daily. And I'm nowhere near eating like the food pyramid so I took that as thinking I'm eating very unhealthy. And I'm not purposly avoiding a healthy diet, I just never puposly tried to eat one either, like I should have. I just eat ehat I find in the kitchen lol. See when you live with 2 sisters and a mom who do the food shopping and all basically like the same things, you eat what they buy. And my family isn't one to care about eating healthy! lol. Basiaclly a typical day for me is a piece of pizza, some cereal(no milk), lots of water and twizzlers :) And that's pretty good if you saw the things in my kitchen!(twinkies. ho hos, ding dongs, tons of soda, all that stuff) So I always knew I wasn't eating the best, just never did anything to change it because everyone my house eats this way, so why go out of my way to get different foods for myself? But, recently I don't know why, I just got this desire to learn about nutrition, and start having a better diet. Hair was a nice motivation for it lol. Plus I'm really into natural kind of "healthy" products for my hair and skin, so I figured if it has to be good to go on my body it should have ot be good to be in my body too, just never thought of it before cuz I'm surrounded by junkfood :) And I was just wondering, before I go into my new healthy nutritous food journey, if it would have an effect on my height. Because I actually like my height. And I've never really seen the results of a healthy diet, so I just wasn't sure what it would do to me, like if it would make me suddenly grow or somethin'. Healthy nutritious things are new to me, so I just thought i'd ask people who aren't new to a healthy diet if it'd change my height a lot, that's all :) I think it came out a lot weirder than I ment for it to come out lol

So....you all probably wanna know how tall I am now huh? You'll get a kick out of this one=) I'm 4'11 and a quarter :oops: But I LIKE it!!!! lol. I like it. I like being a different height than anyone else. I like being able to still get piggy back rides, I like that I get to go infront at things, I like that while all my friends are complaning about how they can't wear heels because they'd be taller than the guys, I can wear heels(and I love heels :) ) and still be a decent level shorter than the guys. I like how my future husband(hey! he will be! :) lol. and you can all come to my wedding! lmao) calls me "pixie", I like being rock n' rolls "tiny dancer". When you think about it there are a lot of benefits to being shorter :) And don't get me wrong, height is a beautiful thing. I just think short is so much more me. I dunno, maybe it makes me feel more 'fairy-like', or maybe I just really like wearing heels, but I love being short. I like dolls, maybe because I think I look like more of a doll lol. Whatever it is I just really like it, and hey not many adults can say they're under 5ft! lol, I will be, even if it is only by an inch :) But I also would NEVER want to be any shorter! =o) Not at all lol

So anyways, I'm gonna try to eat better now :) I doubt I'll grow much more, because if what you guys are saying is true that you don't grow much more after you get your first period, then it makes sense that I stopped getting taller at 12. Since I got my period at 11 then 12 isn't an odd age to stop growing at, right? I was just concerened if eating better was suddenly gonna make me grow A LOT, but from these replies I take it it won't :) And I don't mind getting the inch here and there taller, I think I was just thinking I was gonna grow 12 inches with my first Flinestones vitamin lol.
So I guess I won't grow much more :) But even if I did I now releize it's better to just eat right so that I can live a long healthy life :)

Thanks everyone! It was so nice of ya'll to help me out! :D *hugs* Oh and I'm acutally eating a banana now :) it's a start!

yikes this is long, sorry

Holy mackerel, Sara, you've got issues girl!

First off, let me ask: Where do you live??? Hehe.

Okay, okay. I think that you have stunted your growth with poor eating habits. What do you mean by "grow"? As in taller, wider? Older?


lol, You wanna know where I live? No you really don't, but I'll tell ya where I live lol. Well I live in this really dull place, right in the middle of Boring-ville, on the corner of Nowhere land and straight down the 'Nothing happens Here' street is where you'll find my house :) In other words New Hampshire=P But atleast it's southern NH! So I am really close to being in Mass! I didn't think it was worth mentioning in the location thing becuase it's really boring no one should wanna know where it is lol. I am so moving to Los Angeles in a year :D

And you think I have issues?? lol awww, now I think I compleytly made a fool out of myself in a really cool message board that I'd like to post more at. Let's just forget my first post, I think I exaggerated too much in it lol. I can be a bit of a drama queen sometimes =)

Oh and I ment taller, I had the wider bit down fine lol
:)

[quote="KT"]

I meant that not wanting to grow, and wanting the stay the same size since you were 12 isn't healthy. Not "not growing after you were 12 isn't healthy" See what I mean?

If she wasn't eating right before age 12 she might have been a pretty tiny 12 year old. Which means her growth was probably already stunted before she hit 12.

I'm not trying to sound mean either but refusing to eat right is basically what she said because she was afraid of becoming a giant.

You need to eat right to stay healthy, and that's not my definition of staying healthy. So that's why I said it was very unhealthy.

Just wanted to clear that up a bit. I'm not mad, or trying to shoot anyone down. :)

I understand what you're saying :) But it's not what I ment, I'm not good at explaing things either ;) I just ment I want to be the same height that I was at 12 not Size. And I don't think that's unhealthy, is it? I mean lots of people say they want to be this height or that height, so I don't think it's wrong or unhealthy to say I want to stay the height that I was(and still am) at 12, I just like being short lol, as weird as that may sound :)

What I tihnk you're saying is that it's unhealthy to want to stay the same size as I was when I was 12, not height right? Because I defenitley would never want to be the same size I was when I was 12! lol. I don't think my growth was already stunted before I hit 12, I was tiny but I wasn't any tinyer than the other kids at school. And I'm not the same size I was since I was 12, when I said I didn't grow any since then I ment height wise, sorry if that was unclear. I definitley got those hips getting wider thing they teach you about in health class.
Do you still think it's unhealthy? Does anyone here know what the singer Christina Aguleria looks like? Because I want to use her as an example. She's short(same height as me) but she doesn't look unhealthy or anything(alteast I don't think so) or have the body of a 12 year old. I basically have the same body type as hers. And I like it, my body grew so I don't look like I'm 12, but it just didn't grow taller any, so I still have that short cuteness :) Do I sound unhealthy? I hope I'm not lol. I go to the doctors every year for a yearly check up. I just hope you know what I'm talking about, I don't want to come off as some unhealthy sickling lol.
:)

Strawberry,
There is nothing unhealthy about wanting to stay petite if that is your natural body type, nor is it unhealthy be the same height as when you 12. As I've mentioned before, I am the same weight and height as I was when I was 11 (but a much different shape :)), so I know what you are talking about. I'm quite happy to be 5' 1.5" (apart from the high shelves issue LOL!), and as you say, there are lots of gorgeous, curvy women who are short and make great role models for us :)

What we were concerned about is that in your first post, you suggested that you were prepared to eat in an unhealthy way and not get enough vitamins and minerals in order to stay small. We just want you to eat well and be healthy, and not be scared of vitamins whatever size and height you are :)

I hope that has made things clearer for you - we really do care here, and sometimes maybe we over-react when someone seems to have a problem, but we just want the best for all our friends, and by posting here, you've become one of us :)

Strawberry,
There is nothing unhealthy about wanting to stay petite if that is your natural body type, nor is it unhealthy be the same height as when you 12. As I've mentioned before, I am the same weight and height as I was when I was 11 (but a much different shape :)), so I know what you are talking about. I'm quite happy to be 5' 1.5" (apart from the high shelves issue LOL!), and as you say, there are lots of gorgeous, curvy women who are short and make great role models for us :)

What we were concerned about is that in your first post, you suggested that you were prepared to eat in an unhealthy way and not get enough vitamins and minerals in order to stay small. We just want you to eat well and be healthy, and not be scared of vitamins whatever size and height you are :)

I hope that has made things clearer for you - we really do care here, and sometimes maybe we over-react when someone seems to have a problem, but we just want the best for all our friends, and by posting here, you've become one of us :)

Thanks KT :) You helped me a lot, and you'r very kind. It's also really nice to see another person on these boards who didn't gain much height or weight since they were really young but are a different shape, I'm not alone! lol.
I would've replied sooner, sorry I didn't, but the first week of April is like the busiest time in my family lol, and fun :)
And thanks especially for that last paragraph, it means a lot. I really like these boards and the people here, so I really appreciate that :)

Thank you again! *hugs*