In-depth article: "Sitting for a long time" makes your body lose

The impact of sitting for a long time on you

Today I will talk about the impact of long sitting for a long time on the body. Nowadays, many people are in a sitting life, sitting for a long time on work, watching TV and playing computer after get off work.

You must understand that your body and brain will adapt to how you use it. For example, your body will become stronger and stronger due to adaptation by frequently lifting weights. Think about how much time we spend in a day sitting? What kind of adaptation changes will it cause for the body?

The left is a normal posture; the right is a pelvic tilt forward

The impact of sitting for a long time on you includes muscle atrophy, muscle shortening and fascia adhesion (Fascia Binding)

When we don't use our muscles, they will become weak. Because our bodies are very "efficient". If the muscles we don't use often, it will start to atrophy because the body does not need to spend extra energy to maintain unnecessary muscles.

In addition, your body will also adapt to your muscle length, so your body will really change its shape to adapt to the posture and movements you do most often (sitting).

Sleeping for a long time will cause the hip flexor muscles (iliopsoas muscles) to shorten. When you sit with the hip flexor muscles in a shortened position all day, long-term adaptation will cause the pelvic tilt forward, and It causes a lot of pressure on the lower back. Therefore, if you adapt to the sitting position for a long time, it will be difficult to stand upright because the hip flexor muscles are too tight and the pelvis is tilted forward when standing.

Hip flexor muscles are only one of the problems caused by sitting for a long time, and the hind legs (Hamstrings) will become shorter and shorter. The hind legs are connected from the bottom of the pelvis to the upper part of the tibia and fibula.

So when you sit down and bend your knees, the shortened hind legs will pull our pelvis backward, which is also one of the sources of many lower back pain.

The left is the hind hind legs (Hamstrings) of normal length; the right is the shortened hind legs (Hamstrings) that pull the pelvis backward

Then you may want to say that the hind hip flexor muscles and the hind legs will pull the pelvis in different directions, so that everything will be balanced! But this is not the case. They all become tighter and tighter, which will reduce the range of movement of your pelvic muscles and the natural location of a healthy body. The shortened posterior leg muscles will cause tightening and flexion to occur.

Long sitting causes shortening of the posterior leg muscles and hip flexion muscles, and the gluteus maxillary muscles will be lengthened. The gluteus maxillary muscles will not be stretched for a long time, and the gluteus maxillary muscles will fall asleep and inactivate. Research shows that inactivated gluteus maxillary muscles and overactivated posterior leg muscles may cause lower back pain.

The shortened posterior leg muscles will cause tightening and flexion to be limited, and the shortened posterior leg muscles will pull our pelvis backward. It makes us unable to sit in a natural pelvic position.

The weak external oblique muscles make the pelvic tilt forward, and the pelvic tilt forward shortens the lumbar muscles, shortening of the lumbar muscles suppresses the gluteus muscles, and the weak lumbar muscles and tightening of the lumbar muscles restricts hip extension and hip extension The result is lumbar compensation, which is lower back pain and pre-hip pain.

So, core stability and hip mobility affect each other. When the hip joint is still, the lumbar spine will compensate for movement.

I will introduce a little here what is hip joint and moving lumbar spine?

This is the hip joint

Luminous spine

What is the difference between moving hip joint and moving lumbar spine?

When the knee is lifted by more than 90 degrees, the hip joint movement is limited, and the iliopsoas muscle is weak, and the person who cannot bend the hip hip more than 90 degrees will want to flex the lumbar spine, and lean forward to touch the knee with the chest. Lumbar flexion is the main reason for intervertebral disc herniation.

In addition, quadrupled hips in a four-leg kneeling position (quadrupted) bent-knee leg When the hip joint movement is limited and cannot stretch, the lumbar spine will produce compensation to become lumbar spine stretching.

People with bad back usually have very flat hips, and the solution is to train to start the hip muscles and let the hips start working. When the hips are awakened, the problem of low back pain will be improved.

For people who have been sitting for a long time:

1. Stay upright and correct sitting posture and sit on your sedentary bone .

2. Maintain physical activity

Try not to keep the body in a static position for a long time, as it will make the muscles stiff and shorten, and you should stand up and move after a period of time.

3. Muscle strength training and stretching

Last let’s take a look at the video teaching: 20 movements to improve hip joint mobility!

Last reminder again, if you don’t know how to properly train and start the hip muscles, you can ask a professional coach to teach you.