What Happens to Your Body When You Sit Down Too Much?

Most of us probably spend more time sitting down than we realise. We sit to eat breakfast, sit in the car on the way to work, sit at a desk, sit while we have lunch, drive home and then eventually sit on the sofa. Even if you exercise regularly, it’s surprisingly easy for a large part of the rest of your day to involve very little movement.

The problem isn't sitting down, it's spending long periods sitting with very little movement in between. When we sit for extended periods, our muscles simply aren’t being asked to do very much. The large muscles in our legs and hips become relatively inactive, our overall energy expenditure drops and we miss out on all the small amounts of movement that would normally happen if we were standing, walking and generally moving around. Over time, a very sedentary lifestyle is associated with an increased risk of a number of health problems, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. It can also contribute to weight gain, particularly if long periods of sitting are combined with low overall activity and consuming more energy than we use.

Then there’s the way sitting can make us feel. If you’ve ever stood up after a couple of hours at a desk or a long car journey and felt like you’ve suddenly aged 20 years, you’ll know exactly what we mean. Your hips can feel tight, your back can feel stiff and those first few steps can be less graceful than you’d like. That doesn’t necessarily mean sitting has damaged your back or shortened your muscles. Often, your body simply hasn’t changed position for a while. Moving around, changing position and getting your muscles working again can quickly make things feel better. Interestingly, going to the gym doesn’t necessarily cancel out an otherwise completely sedentary day either. Someone could exercise for an hour in the morning and still spend most of the remaining waking hours sitting down. That workout is absolutely beneficial, but regular movement throughout the day still matters.

Fortunately, the answer isn’t replacing your office chair with a treadmill or trying to spend the entire day standing up. It’s simply about breaking up long periods of sitting. Get up while the kettle boils, walk around when you’re on the phone, take a five-minute walk at lunchtime, stand up between meetings, go upstairs instead of asking somebody else to fetch something and if you’ve been watching television for a while, get up and move around during the adverts or between episodes. None of those things feel particularly significant on their own, but across a day and then across an entire week, they add up.

It’s also why we encourage people to think about movement and exercise as two slightly different things. Your gym sessions might provide the structured strength and cardiovascular exercise your body needs, while your everyday movement keeps you active during all the hours in between. You don’t need to obsess over standing every 30 minutes or worry that sitting on the sofa in the evening is undoing all your hard work. Health rarely works in such rigid terms. Instead, pay attention to how much of your day is spent completely still. If you realise you’ve been sitting for a long time, get up, stretch your legs and move around for a few minutes. Sometimes improving your health isn’t about adding another workout to your week. It’s simply about finding more reasons to get out of your chair. white terms. Instead, just pay a little more attention to how much of your day is spent completely still and look for easy opportunities to move when they appear. Sometimes improving your health isn’t about squeezing another workout into an already busy week. It might simply be about finding a few more reasons to get out of your chair.