Let’s dive in deep into this matter as to what areas of our health this sedentary lifestyle effects, see precisely how it does and how to tackle this bad habit. Starting off with our numero uno culprit.

Makes you Fat

Fat in our body is mainly found in the form of triglycerides. Being insoluble in blood triglycerides wrap themselves in protein structures called lipoproteins to travel around the body.

To make use of the fat, both muscle and fat tissue produce an enzyme called lipoprotein lipase. This enzyme breaks down the lipoproteins, reveal the triglyceride and breaks it down further by means of a process called hydrolysis into free fatty acids.

This disturbance in balance allows the fat cells to convert more and more fatty acids to triglycerides

Free fatty acids are mainly utilized in two ways — either get consumed by the skeletal muscle tissues for energy or get converted back to fat.

There, however, exists a fine balance between how much of fatty acids are being absorbed in the body (which you don’t want to disturb).

It’s the job of the tissues (muscle and fat) to promote overall muscle development and maintenance while limiting too much of fat storage by maintaining that proper balance. [2]

Having a high concentration of lipoprotein lipase in the skeletal muscle tissues results in a phenomenon called substrate stealing.

This is nothing but the flow of greater amounts of fatty acids for use as energy towards the muscle tissues rather than storing them as fat. [3]

When we tend to rest too much, like for example sitting continuously for hours, our lipoprotein lipase activity in the skeletal muscle tissues sinks down by a considerable margin — thus, disturbing the fine balance. [4]

This disturbance in balance allows the fat cells to convert more and more fatty acids to triglycerides.

As a result, these triglycerides are stored as fat in case they need to be burned down sometime in the future halting fat burn by the muscle tissues at present (time to get some new pants). [5]

Repeat this over and over again over a long duration and you will see your fat banks fill up faster than your actual bank account. Well, you don’t want to fill up your fat banks (unless you want to be a sumo wrestler).

Increases your Chances of Having a Heart Attack

Similar to triglycerides, cholesterols also need to be wrapped in protein structure to be able to move around the body.

Yes, wrapped in the good old lipoproteins.

Our body, mainly the liver produces different kinds of lipoproteins from the food we eat to transport triglycerides and cholesterols to different parts of our body smoothly.

Among these various types of lipoproteins are two types which concern us the most regarding heart attacks.

One of them is called Low Density Lipoprotein(LDL) and the other one is called High Density Lipoprotein (HDL).

The main difference between them being in the ratio of cholesterol to protein concentration. LDL has a higher cholesterol concentration whereas HDL has a higher protein concentration.

The main job of LDL is to deliver cholesterols to different parts where needed. HDL clears off the excess cholesterols. [6][7]

These bumps restricts the amount of blood through the artery to the heart

When LDL moves through the large and mid-sized arteries, they start irritating the inner walls of the artery.

This causes a breakage of the layer and unsolicited entry of LDL within the inner membranes of the artery present beyond the safe wall (wish it was as strong as The Great Wall of China).

As a protective mechanism, our body has cells called macrophages which patrol around the body flowing with the blood to spot irregular activities or foreign cells.

If spotted, foreign materials are flushed out from the body. Detecting abnormal entry of LDL into the inner membrane of the artery, macrophages try to engulf the LDL and remove it from the crime scene.

In the process, the macrophages end up dying (goodbye, old friend) and forming more clutter within the membrane which results in a bump in the artery wall (kind of like the wall built by Spartans).

This bump has a name — artery plaque.

Clogging the pathway, these bumps restricts the amount of blood through the artery to the heart. Keep this going on, the artery blockage can become significant enough to give you a heart attack. [8][9]