Stretch Your Legs, Save Your Life

Sitting behind a desk all day or driving in a long commute can already wreak havoc on your back and your backside, and then add to that lazing on the couch after an arduous work week, your body is in danger of too much rest. Especially during the winter where bike rides and long walks with the dog are not motivating ways to get you to go outside and get your heart pumping, recent studies have shown that sitting too much can increase your risk for serious health problems.

Although you are supposed to get between six and ten hours of sleep per day, depending on what your body needs, on the opposite side of the spectrum, being inactive while awake is proving to be more harmful than it is helpful to a lot of areas from your skin and blood circulation to your weight and your overall heart health. Long periods of inactivity will inevitably lead to an influx of pounds because your body will not be burning off the calories you consume during the day. Hospital or at-home patients who are on bed rest (including pregnant women) are often reminded to be rolled over or helped up and moved often in order to stave off bed sores or blood clots, neither of which you want to endure. Even if you stick to an exercise routine and eat a healthy diet of veggies and fruits, if most of your day is spent on your rear, you could still be at a high risk for internal problems down the line.

A 2009 study from Canada backs this up by investigating the periods of rest in different groups who both exercised the same amount per day. The more inactive group ended up having higher risks for cardiovascular disease, for some of which could be fatal. Over 17,000 Canadiens participated in the multi-part study done by the Pennington Biomedical Research Center. Scientists studied the length of seated time and theorized that for the group that sat the most, these people were around 50 percent more likely to die in the years allowed for the follow-up process. Although some of the people in this group were obese, the scientists controlled for factors like smoking, age, health problems, alcohol consumption, and weight between the groups.

Sitting for more than four hours—the minimum period of inactivity the scientists deemed more dangerous—they found that allowing the body to become sloppy can lead to a problematic production of lipase, the enzyme secreted by the pancreas that breaks down the fat molecules of your body.