The Sitting Disease - Are You Dying from It?

Okay first a very brief overview on the history of man, they were primarily either nomads spending most of their day hunting and on their feet or a farmer and spent most of their day farming also on their feet. There was no such thing as an 8 hour work day back then and there were no grocery stores so a person likely hunted or farmed as much as they were able in a day spending the majority (probably almost all) of their waking hours on their feet.

People today sit about 9.3 hours a day factoring for time spent at work and on the couch or at a desk for their leisure time. Now review back to the history of man. We were not built to sit, we were built to walk. Now this is where it gets really scary, sitting for 6+ hours a day makes you up to 40% likelier to die within 15 years than someone who only sits for 3 hours a day - this factors in if after those 6+ hours you exercise. Exercise will not deter the sitting disease.

Okay enough about how it's killing you physically, let's move on to how it's killing you emotionally. Obese people sit for 2.5 hours more than thin people, 1 in 3 Americans is obese. Sitting only expends the energy you body burns just from having working organs, you aren't burning off all that takeout we're all so fond of in our busy lives. 

Actually let me insert a rant into here real quick on the "busy life". The busy life entails a person who works for 8 or more hours, sleeps usually for only about 7, spends 2 hours in transit and then spends the remaining 7 hours surfing the web. You are NOT busy. You can make time for a healthier you. Actual busy people are so busy they schedule everything and even they can usually find one hour in their day to spend at the park or engaged in a non-sitting activity. End of rant.

When a person is sitting the electrical activity in your legs stops, your body is only burning 1 calorie per minute (your organs keeping you alive), really great digestive enzymes that help you break down that double cheeseburger drop down 90%, after sitting 2 consecutive hours your good cholesterol (HDL) drops 20% (FYI - this one is a factor for heart disease), and after 24 hours (I hope NO ONE really does this) insulin effectiveness drops 24% risking diabetes. I realize most people have to sit at work but you CAN get up every hour or so and walk to the water cooler or to the restroom to simple lower the sitting disease's effect.

People who sit and watch TV for 3 hours are 64% more likely to die of heart disease. Yeah, believe it, I watch several hours of TV a night and I have heart valve disease. It's all true. Now, when I want to watch TV I make sure to do it walking in place or streamed over a tablet or TV while I'm on the treadmill (way to reward healthy habits, with TV!).

Statistics were pulled from MedicalBillingandCoding.org, I claim all the snarkiness. :)