The ultimate guide to sitting disease
By Jeff Brushie From Unbreak Yourself
Sitting disease may not sound like something to worry about, but in reality, it could be one of the biggest health issues many of us face.
What’s important to understand when considering sitting disease is the fact that many of us have sedentary lifestyles because of our work, our commutes we spend in the car, and our leisure activities which often include computers, TVs and other electronic devices.
The body isn’t meant to be sedentary, at least not to the level of a modern lifestyle. Our bodies by design are meant to move, and when we aren’t moving, it can have devastating health effects.
When it comes to sitting disease and a sedentary lifestyle, it can be difficult to combat. For example, you may spend eight hours or more a day sitting because of your job. You have to find ways to integrate more movement into your day, even in the workplace, to overcome the effects of being sedentary.
A few things to know about our sedentary lifestyles:
- The fourth leading risk factor for mortality throughout the world is being physically inactive
- An estimated 3.2 million deaths each year are attributed to not being active enough
- The average person spends 12 hours sitting each day
What Is a Sedentary Lifestyle?
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), people should participate in at least 150 minutes of moderate exercise a day, or 75 minutes of more vigorous exercise.
We should also walk around 10,000 steps each day, which is the equivalent of five miles in order to combat the effects of inactivity.
However, the World Health Organization says 60 to 85% of the population of the world doesn’t get enough physical activity.
A sedentary lifestyle means that you don’t get enough physical activity regularly.
Research cited by the American Heart Association shows sedentary jobs have gone up a staggering 83% since 1950. Jobs that are considered physically active makeup less than 20% of the U.S. workforce currently, while physically active jobs made up nearly half of all jobs in 1960.
To be considered moderately active versus sedentary, you would need to do the equivalent of walking anywhere from 1.5 to 3 miles a day at a pace of three to four miles an hour. A person who’s considered active will walk more than three miles a day and sometimes quite a bit more.
Physical activity is included as anything that has you moving. Even something as simple as standing is counted as physical activity. Sedentary behavior involves little to no movement.
What’s hard to understand with this topic is the fact that even if you’re exercising every day, you can still be sedentary. For example, maybe you exercise thirty minutes or an hour every day but if outside of that time you’re spending the rest of your time sitting or lying down, you still have a sedentary lifestyle.
Technology has contributed almost entirely to the shift toward sedentary lifestyles for many people. Yes, technology makes life and even work more convenient, but that can come at a cost to our health.
Along with the fact that more jobs are sedentary than ever before in history, Americans also work more now. They work on average 47 hours a week, which adds up to 164 more hours a year than just two decades ago.
What Is Sitting Disease?
Sitting disease is a broad term that can be used to describe any of the ill health effects of sitting too much.
The following are some of the general effects of sitting disease or having an inactive lifestyle:
- You’re burning fewer calories when you’re not spending much of your day moving, and that can mean you’re more likely to gain weight.
- Your metabolism may slow down, making it more challenging for your body to break down sugar and fat.
- Blood circulation may be affected.
- Sometimes when people have a sedentary lifestyle, it causes loss of muscle strength and endurance because muscles aren’t being used enough.
- Bones can weaken.
A sedentary lifestyle can also increase levels of inflammation in your body and inflammation is linked to many chronic diseases.
Sometimes metabolic syndrome is a term also used interchangeably with sitting disease.
Metabolic syndrome is a group of conditions that tend to occur with one another, and they increase the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and stroke.
The conditions that make up metabolic syndrome are high blood pressure and high blood sugar, excess body fat in the midsection, and high cholesterol or triglyceride levels.
When you have metabolic syndrome it can put you at a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes and heart and blood vessel diseases such as heart attack or stroke.
Along with these health conditions, certain cancers, including breast, uterine and colon cancer, may be more likely to occur in people with a sedentary lifestyle.
If you don’t move enough, it can make chronic pain worse. For example, sitting for just four hours consecutively can put increased pressure on the discs in your lower back.
Sitting Disease and Cancer
One German analysis of 43 separate studies that looked at more than four million people found sedentary lifestyles significant increased people’s risk of cancer.
For example, those people who spent the most time sitting had a 24% higher risk of developing colon cancer, and a 21% higher risk of lung cancer.
Research also shows that high levels of body fat can cause chronic inflammation. Chronic inflammation can then attack the cells of your body and cause DNA damage that leads to cancer.
The Mental Effects of a Sedentary Lifestyle
Being sedentary doesn’t just take a physical toll on our bodies—it also affects our mental health.
For example, if you don’t get enough physical activity during your day, it can make it tougher to fall asleep and stay asleep at night.
A sedentary lifestyle can make you more likely to feel psychological distress. For example, a survey of more than 3,300 government employees in Australia found that men who sat for more than six hours a day at work were 90% more likely to feel moderate psychological distress such as hopelessness, nervousness, and restlessness, compared to men who sat for less than three hours a day.
If you’re not getting enough physical activity, it can increase your risk of anxiety, but on the other hand when you engage in exercise it can boost your endorphins and have effects on your mood that are on-par with prescription antidepressants.
What Can You Do About Sitting Disease?
There are many lifestyle changes that you can make to either prevent or combat sitting disease and the effects of a sedentary life. Some are bigger changes that you’ll need to make to your lifestyle, but there are also easy shifts you can make that can have a big impact.
Stand More
If you do nothing else, try and stand more throughout your day. Standing up more frequently is a good way to break up your workday and it can have more an effect than you might believe. Low-intensity activities like standing and walking are more important than we think, and even a low activity level that’s consistent throughout your day can be more important metabolically even than our high-intensity workouts.
A good place to start is alternating between sitting and standing every thirty minutes.
This is easy and you can do it throughout your workday.
Just standing more can have some of the following benefits:
- Standing more can improve your bone health because our bones need regular movement to stay strong. Low-level activity can be optimal to maintain the strength and integrity of your bones.
- Standing more helps aid in the delivery of oxygen and nutrients throughout the body and to the brain because it improves blood flow.
- If you move, even if it’s just standing up, it burns calories.
- Reducing your time spent sedentary in even a small way can lower the risk of cardiovascular disease and reduce the risk of early death.
- If you feel tired or like your energy is lagging throughout your day, standing up frequently can help give you a quick shot of energy and make you feel more alert.
- If you stand more when you’re at work, it can boost your mental awareness and help your productivity and concentration.
Get More Active At Home
Along with standing more, there are things you can do at home and at work that will help you be more active and will cut your risk of developing sitting disease.
First, try to increase the intensity at which you do your housework, both indoors and outdoors.
Many people don’t realize how much activity housework and chores can help them fit in their day.
Try and focus on several chores you want to accomplish each day, and do them at a fast-pace.
If you typically hire someone to do outdoor work, you might think about doing some of it on your own.
Additional easy tips for incorporating into your life at home include:
- Keep a set of light hand weights wherever you typically watch TV. You can lift them and incorporate them into your routine so that you don’t even think about doing it. You can also find other ways to be active while you watch TV—for example, maybe you do some stretching while you’re watching. You can also spend time bouncing on an exercise ball while you’re watching TV or on your computer.
- Try to make time to walk around your neighborhood every day. It doesn’t have to be a rigorous walk, and you can use it as a time to reconnect with your spouse at the end of the day or be outside with your kids. Use it as a time to relax and unwind.
- Pace while you text, talk on the phone, or respond to emails.
Get More Active at Work
Your workplace is probably where you spend a large chunk of your life, and it may also be where you’re almost entirely sedentary. Consider integrating the following tips into your workday:
- Stand up every thirty minutes, and try to walk around your office at least once every hour.
- Stand when you talk on the phone.
- Use your break to take a walk, even if it’s only a few minutes.
- Consider a compact treadmill, stair stepper, or elliptical under your desk. These are great small pieces of workout equipment that are designed to go under a desk so you can fit it movement throughout your day.
Other Ways to Break Your Sedentary Lifestyle
Other general things to incorporate into your life to reduce how sedentary you are include:
- Wear an activity tracker—this forces you to be conscious of how much you are or aren’t moving in a day. Set goals for your steps and the number of calories you’d like to burn each day.
- Move your body as soon as you wake up every day. You don’t have to do it for long, and it doesn’t have to be too strenuous but as soon as you get up each day make it a point to be active.
- Try home workouts. There are so many great home workout programs so you don’t have to join a gym, and it takes away some of the excuses you may have for yourself as far as why you can’t or don’t want to workout.
- Regularly play music in your house because music gives you energy and encourages you to move.
- Cook more of your own meals. This is good not just from the nutrition standpoint, but you’re active when you’re cooking.
- Plant a garden. You can grow your own food, which is great, but it’s also giving you a reason to get up and head outside so you can take care of it.
- When you go inside a store, take a lap around the perimeter before you start shopping.
- If you don’t have a pet, but you think you could take on the responsibility, get a dog. A dog will encourage you to get out and about and stay active.
Being sedentary has become an unfortunate byproduct of the convenience afforded to us by technology and a modern lifestyle, but it doesn’t have to be your reality. Be conscious about the level of physical activity you get each day, and find creative but attainable ways to move your body more each and every day, whether you’re at home or work.
