How to sit

Sounds silly, right? Why think about on this silly topic of How to sit? But this very common topic have certain positive, and negative effects on our body, depending on the way we sit. So, let’s discuss on this common but a very important aspect of our life.

Normally, we sit on a chair, on the couch or sofa, on the floor, etc. The way we sit affects a lot of our body parts like our hips, lower back, spine, waist, shoulders, neck and our head. Interesting! Isn’t it? Sitting for a longer period of time, in the office or at home in front of the television or even while driving a car, allocates inadequate burden alongside our spine and back. Later on, these long term along with poor sitting styles, over stress can cause tension headaches, pain in the lower back and shoulders and even disc problems. So, let’s check out some sitting positions that could be damaging to your body:-

Crossing legs at the knee

While you sit with your legs crossed, the area around your fibular head gets annoyed, which is just below the knee, it can tweak the peroneal nerve. Crossing your legs cause extra burden on your hip muscles and sciatic nerve due to the changes of the pelvic position. This can cause long-term back pain.
Solution: Always sit with your legs uncrossed. Do the leg cradle supine movement which gives elasticity to your hip muscles which got stiff by sitting this way.

Slouching

A common sitting position for people with desk jobs, slouching- the head is pushed forward and out of placement pressurizing the muscles to work harder to hold back. It stresses the shoulder and neck muscles that cause tension headaches. Slouching causes ample of stress to the trodden spine reasoning to lower back pain.
Solution: Keep an alarm or reminder on your PC to check your posture and stand up and be alert of your sitting position. Use a lumbar roll or a small towel in the small of your back to maintain an erect pose. To maintain your upper body and lower back do yoga poses and exercises.

Crossing legs under each other

This pretzel-style position swaps your hip and knee joints and stresses them. This causes stiff hamstrings and knee and backache. In long term, it causes a burden on the hip capsule by continuous spin.
Solution: Change this position habit. To neutralize the strain on the hips and knees, add the Foam roll and It Band and Hand walks in your everyday routine. Do stretching exercises daily.

One leg up, one leg down

Sitting with one leg up on the chair and one leg hanging down, causes your pelvis to spin in such a manner that normally wouldn’t and refrain it from spin logically. This leads to sacroiliitis or irritation of the SI joints- a reason for lower back pain.
Solution: This habit is a no-no. Stabilize your body and to ease your lower back, increase Glute Bridges to your everyday routine. Try placing a small pillow or ball between your knees while doing this exercise, it helps set off your abs and hip muscles. Thus, enlightening your strength and steadiness.

Overall, stretching exercises prove very effective for relieving stress around the abs, hips and lower back area, if done on an everyday basis.