WHAT THE EXPERTS RECOMMEND
Now that you know sitting is a hidden health hazard, you have to find ways to “steal” time on your feet. Among the most popular that experts recommend:
- Stand while watching TV — or, at the very least, walk around during commercials.
- Never sit for more than 30 consecutive minutes without taking a five-minute walking break.
- Stand at your workstation — or, even better, use a desk treadmill.
- Take the stairs instead of the elevator.
- Park as far away from your destination as you can.
- Use a Swiss exercise ball in lieu of a chair — sitting on it will engage your core and legs, and improve your posture.
Most of us spend a vast majority of our waking hours sitting.
In our cars.
At our workstations.
On our couches and chairs.
Indeed, the conveniences of modern life enable our minds to work harder than ever — while our bodies atrophy.
And growing research shows that perhaps the greatest hidden health threat we all face is from simply sitting too much.
Turns out, beyond simple matters of posture and muscle stiffness, there’s an array of deleterious effects — many of which compromise life expectancy — associated with prolonged periods of sitting. Even worse, you can’t simply exercise these effects away.
But, if you take a stand — literally! — against the “seat of tyranny,” it’s not too late to undo the damage.
So, with a nod to Gloria Estefan, here are just some of the reasons why, starting today, you need to “get on your feet!”
1. HEART HEALTH
Of course, during February's national Heart Month, awareness about cardiovascular wellness becomes all the more heightened. Heart disease has long been the leading cause of death in men and women in the U.S. Studies show that prolonged sitting negatively impacts the ancillary functions connected to heart hearth — blood fats, blood sugar, blood pressure and hormone levels related to metabolism and appetite.
But even more alarming, says Dr. David B. Agus in his new book “The Lucky Years: How to Thrive in the Brave New World of Health,” is that new research shows that being seated too long affects how your genes behave.
He mentions a specific gene called lipid phosphate phosphatase 1 (LPP1), which “helps to keep our cardiovascular system healthy by preventing dangerous blood clotting and inflammation. But it’s significantly suppressed when the body is idle for a few hours, so it can’t do its job … Even exercise won’t impact this gene if the muscles have been inactive most of the day.”
2. OSTEOARTHRITIS and SPINAL/CERVICAL DAMAGE
The bones in your joints become weaker when they’re not being used — i.e., bearing weight. Not only does this make them more susceptible to the pain of osteoarthritis when you do use them, but lest you ever fall, you’re far more likely to suffer a fracture if you’re an over-sitter.
What’s more, extended periods of sitting — be it while driving, watching TV or in front of your computer/laptop/smart handheld device — do untold amounts of cumulative damage to your neck, spine, shoulders and back. When we sit for extended periods, our soft connective tissue naturally contracts and, over time, loses elasticity. Throw in slouchy posture and the stress of professional responsibilities and, well, it’s a recipe for orthopedic disaster.
3. ORGAN DAMAGE
Your poor internal organs! When we sit too long, everything slows down — including blood flow and metabolism. And when blood flow slows down, your organs don’t get the nourishment they need. First, this impairs their function. Next, it leads to disease — including cancer. To wit, findings presented last year at the Inaugural Active Working Summit found that sitting increases lung cancer likelihood by 54 percent, uterine cancer by 66 percent and colon cancer by 30 percent. Blood flow also affects the liver, kidneys and pancreas, and, according to research published in the journal Diabetologia, sitting for eight hours daily increases the likelihood of developing type 2 by 90 percent.
4. DISEASE, DISEASE … AND MORE DISEASE
Dr. James Levine, an endocrinologist with the Mayo Clinic and Arizona State University, and director of Obesity Solutions, is as anti-sitting as Bernie Sanders is anti-top-1-percenters. He’s among those credited with creating and popularizing today’s treadmill work desks. In his book “Get Up!: Why Your Chair Is Killing You and What You Can Do About It,” Levine says there are at least two dozen different chronic diseases and conditions associated with excessive sitting. Simply standing sets off an entire cascade of cellular functions that helps protect the body against these diseases. As he writes, “The nature of the human body was to be active and moving all day. The body was never designed to be crammed into a chair where all of these cellular mechanisms get switched off.”
5. DECREASED LIFE EXPECTANCY
According to family physician and New York Times best-selling author Dr. James Mercola, a study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine concluded that each hour spent watching television (read: sitting down) past age 25 reduces your life expectancy by nearly 22 minutes. That equates to a five-year reduction in life expectancy for those who sit six hours daily. Mercola, like Levine, is now so convinced of the damaging effects of sitting that, he says, he’s made a conscious effort to “to reduce my normal 12 to 14 hours of daily sitting to under one hour.”
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