Writer’s Illness – What Sitting Too Long Is Doing To Your Body

It seems writers are at high risk due to their sitting job, to get different illnesses caused by sitting too long.

Who of us doesn’t know the situation that just when we are writing a particularly demanding scene in our book, we have to get up? Our back hurts, our eyes burn, our legs seem to be on fire, our feet are numb, and we have to go to the bathroom. And still, we ignore all these signs that scream at us to get up and walk around, and we continue concentrating on finishing our scene rather than giving our body some relief.

Studies show that sitting too long can cause serious injuries and damage to our body and can even kill us.

Some of us, in our long writing careers, can face health problems like:

• weight gain, weak muscles, and resulting diabetes
• poor blood circulation, possibly causing thrombosis, heart disease, cancer, and even brain damage
• posture problems, resulting in chronic neck and lower back pain
• eyesight problems
• anxiety and depression

In other words, this means: sitting in front of a computer like a pretzel, hour after hour isn’t doing our bodies much good.

picture courtesy of Google.com

There are, indeed, several workouts and exercises for us to practice while sitting, and in particular after getting up. We all know, when writers are inside their story they don’t like to get up. We have no idea when writer’s block might hit, we’re on a deadline, or we forget our body. All reasons are insufficient. A short walk to relax our eyes, our neck, our back, our brain, to use our muscles, get the blood circulating and our heart working, is a good thing!

Very important is to make sure our computer, keyboard, and monitor are set up for us to use it in a healthy way. Our arms and hands, our neck and spine and our feet will thank us.

And one more personal advice: get a massage once in a while. It’s relaxing, helps our body, and refreshes our brain. We’re working hard, we deserve some pampering.

Let’s keep us healthy and remind ourselves that we need to be in good shape to write a good story.