Can a seat cushion relieve pain?

If you spend more than six hours a day sitting on your backside (something that nearly 75% of all Americans over the age of 16 are guilty of), you are quite literally destroying yourself from the inside out.

According to information published by the Department of Exercise Science at the University of South Carolina, sitting for extended periods of time each and every day – but especially those periods of time that exceed six hours – are responsible for shaving seven years off of its average life span, contributing directly to certain types of cancer, it increases the risk of heart disease by up to 64% or more

We are talking about a major health epidemic here, and most people (sadly) are still unaware of the dangers.

However, by the time you’re done with this quick guide, you’ll not only know all about these inherent dangers and the very real health risks that sitting for extended periods of time is responsible for – but you’ll also better understand what you can do to avoid these problems going forward cancel out the negative impact sitting has on the body.

Let’s get right to it!

The damage begins the second that you sit down

Unlike a lot of other health risks that take some time to really “do their dirty work”, sitting is going to start destroying your body almost from the moment that you park your backside in a chair or on the couch.

Immediately after sitting down, electrical activity throughout your body slows to a crawl, and your metabolism begins to drop to a dangerously low level. We are talking about starting no more than a single calorie (yes, you read that correctly) – a single calorie – a minute.

This can lead to a 40% uptake in insulin (contributing directly to type II diabetes in adults), and that’s only the damage that begins as soon as you sit down.

Things get even worse over time.

After just a week or so of sitting for longer than six hours a day, your body begins to increase the production of fat molecules and negative cholesterol in the body – while at the same time developing a tremendous resistance to all of the insulin that has been flooding your body.

This is going to shoot your body fat level through the roof, causing you to gain fat in a hurry, and before you know it, your muscles begin to atrophy out, oxygenation slows down, and all of a sudden you feel like you’re about 100 years old.

This is after a week.

Can you imagine what happens to you over a month?

A year?

A decade or more?

It’s pretty ugly.

How to counteract the impact of sitting without overhauling your entire lifestyle

There are a couple of different things that you can do (some of Immediately) to begin counteracting the impact that sitting has on your overall health, all without having to make major overhauls of your lifestyle and committing to things that you probably won’t be able to stick to for the rest of your life.

The first is to invest in a quality orthopedic seat cushion.

These cushions are designed specifically to match up perfectly with your body’s aerodynamics, supporting your muscles, your posterior chain, and your central nervous system to negate the overall impact of sitting on your body. It’s not going to eliminate the trouble, but it’s definitely going to put a damper on it.

The second is to commit to standing up for about 10 or 15 minutes each and every hour, breaking up the monotony of sitting down and helping your body rebound from the damage that would have otherwise been done.

It’s also a good idea to incorporate about 30 minutes of physical activity into your daily routine (your daily, not semi-daily routine), and if you can make these minor changes you should really be in the clear.

Final thoughts

To recap, you’re going to want to get your hands on a quality orthopedic seat cushion to lessen the damage that sitting for extended periods of time is going to have on your body (you’ll be able to find some real winners right here), commit to standing for 10 or 15 minutes every single hour, and that you begin to exercise for about 30 minutes each and every single day.

Just making these minor changes will have a dramatic and almost immediate impact on your health and well-being.