The Truth About Sitting and Health Factors

Since I have started writing, I find myself sitting a lot more. I don't know about you, but as I have gotten older, I appreciate a good chair. We sit for everything. Think about it. We sit for work, conversation, meals, sporting events, transportation and especially to watch television. This article looks at sitting and affects it can have on our lives.

According to MedicalBillingandCording.com. sitting is killing us. We find ourselves spending more time on computers during the day and then we spend more time watching television than ever before. This sitting is not doing us any good. We exercise less and this adds up to poor health. Increases in weight, hampered cholesterol control and an increase in heart disease are major concerns. Toss in weak muscles, slower neural responses, reduce flexibility and we soon we see that we are hurting our bone and muscular structure.

Facts
Here are some other factors to consider. Sitting 6 hours a day compared to someone that sits 3 hours a day has a 40 percent chance of dying sooner. This is even if you exercise. I teach health and physical education and I didn't even know that.

Obese individuals sit 2.7 more hours a day than thin people do on the average. Between 1980 and 2000, obesity more than doubled. Sitting time increased by 8 percent during those twenty years. Exercise rates stayed the same during that time.

More Facts
When you sit, electric activity to your legs stops. Calorie burning drops to 1 per minute. Enzymes that break down fat drops by 90 percent. After 2 hours good cholesterol drops by 20 percent. If you use insulin, it's effectiveness drops by 20 percent, too. The risk of diabetes rises. The likely risk of heart disease increases by, get this, 64 percent.

After looking at these facts you can see why they say, we risk the chance of increasing our death by 40 percent.

Help Yourself
Here are some helpful tips to fight off the problem of too much sitting. Do more that 30 minutes of exercise per day. Get out of your chair at work. Stand up and work in place if possible. Cut down on after hour sitting watching television. Get off your lawn mower and push cut your grass. Sit back in your chair instead of forward or up straight. Sitting at 125 degree angle puts less strain on your back. Try it and see.

The human body isn't built for sitting. It is built for locomotion. A good example of how too much sitting can hurt you is the movie " Wall E." The human body tends to become too sediment and changes to just a blog of flesh. In our new way of life, sitting is what we do. It is important to exercise vigorously, watch our diet and take stock of the hours we sit.